EVIL, MOWITY AND OPPRESBXON: TRADITIONAL AND FEMINfST -CS

Andrea Lynne Nicki

A thesis submitted to the Department of Philosophy in confonnity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

Queen's University Kingston, Ontario, Canada April, 1998

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Canada Ethics has traditionally kept at a distance brutal aspects of life, with cold, abstract terms like "equality," wjustice,w l@p~nishment,~as if they were potentially engulfing like an omnipotent mother. This choice of simile is no accident. The kinds of phenomena ethics has put aside figure largely in the lives of women: child abuse, domestic violence, rape. 1 bring these sorts of cases to attention as I critically examine the relationship between evil and morality as rendered by traditional and feminist moral accounts. In showing how different concepts of evil inform different kinds of ethical theory and understandings of moral agency, 1 attempt to produce a moral account that has special relevance for women and other oppressed groups.

The kind of moral perspective 1 arrive at incorporates aspects of a wide variety of philosophical thought: Nietzschefs rejection of traditional moral theories as glorifying qualities associated with the oppressed and contributing to the proliferation of human suffering; Richard Miller's person-centered moral approach according to which one is not required to be a moral saint; Claudia CardVs view that the extent to which one can achieve conventional virtues is dependent on social factors; Susan Babbitt's view that what is morally deviant can sometimes be reasonable; Sarah Hoagland's view that agency is not a matter of overcoming constraints but of acting within them; Machiavelli'ç pragmatic view of good and evil as relative, of a mobile moral agent who moves between extremes; Alison Jaggar's view that members of oppressed groups often experience conventionally unacceptable emotional responses, which are epistemologically subversive; Elizabeth V. Spelman's view that these negative emotions involve judgments about wrongdoing; Marilyn Fryets view that anger implies a claim to a personal domain worthy of respect; Lynn McFall's view that bitterness can sometimes be a moral achievement; and, most importantly, Jaggarls view that feminist ethics is a way of coping with and challenging oppressive social systems toward the creation of a new system of human relations, Drawing on Gramsci's discussion of me Pance, where he makes an important distinction between the mdiplomatw and the "politician," 1 present the moral agent as a political conductor, striving for a new social order. Challenging traditional understandings of good and evil, of virtue and vice, 1 reject the persistent classic utopian view that derives ethical values from a vision of the perfect society and invite 'evill and its 'nasty' emotional associates into the domain of morality, ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

1 would like to thank my supervisor, Michael Fox , for his benevolence and for seeing this thesis through to its very end. His steadfast support-and encouragement during my years at Queenls gave me confidence to mite the kind of thesis 1 could really enjoy writing. 1 would also like to thank my second reader, ~hristine Overall, who generously provided many helpful comments which served to tie together several strands of argument and smooth out other ones. Further, in giving me close and thorough supervision as the main reader for my M.A. thesis, she substantially improved my skills as an academic writer. Another person who has significantly contributed to my academic development is Steve D'Arcy. Steve was always a good source of reference for works relevant to claims and arguments 1 was making in this thesis. In sharing with me his expertise in Marxism he helped me better understand some aspects of Antonio Gramsci's work, to which I refer in Chapter 5. Other people have had a hand in keeping this thesis on a firm course, especially in times when its passage was particularly turbulent and uncertain. To Judah Logan, Ann Liblik, Rosemary Renton, and Benita Hutchinson, a very warm thanks. Sudah's unwavering faith gave me the courage to persist on rather taboo pathways of thought. My discussions with Rosemary about feminism and philosophy helped lead me to fashion a feminist moral account that attempts to do justice to the sometimes nasty facts of women's lives. On this score, my students in the courses on feminist philosophy I taught at Queen's University and at Carleton University also afforded substance and direction for my thought. Susan Babbitt, who was involved early on in this project, deserves ackowledgment for her initial ethusiasm and for helping me clarify some of the ideas. Christine Sypnowich should also be thanked for reading a detailed summary of this thesis at an intermediate stage and providing constructive criticisms.

Finally, 1 have corne to appreciate in writing this thesis, in a still controversial and devalued area of philosophy, the many, tremendous obstacles early pioneers of feminist philosophy must have faced. 1 owe them my gratitude since without their efforts theses of this kind could not be written. iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Impartialism, Moral Saintliness, and the Individual ...... I

Impartialism: Its Appeals Impartialism: ~reoccupationwith Control Morality and the Individual Moral Saintlinesss Richard Miller and Person-Centered Morality

Martha Nussbaum and the Aestheticization of Perçons Iris Murdoch and Dispassionate Reflection

Discrimination and Whitelinessl Thesis Overview Chapter 2: Moral Goodness, Nietzsche and Jane Evrg...... 55 Nietzsche and Christian Morality Pity

Chapter 3: Moral Luck,- Moral Deviance and Reasonableness.. 80 Claudia Card and Moral Luck Susan Babbitt: Morality and Reasonableness Chapter 4: Evil and Moral Agency ...... 102 A. Traditional Ethics 1. Evil as the Absence of Knowledge and as Weakness 2. Evil as the ~aterialand Bodily Realm 3. Evil as Female 4, Evil as Disobedience Bo Care Ethics 5. Evil as Pain and Separation

C. Feminist Ethics

6 Evil as Violence and Victimization; Evil as Male and as Patriarchy Chapter 5: Feminist Ethics and ~achiavelli...... 137 A. Sarah Hoagland's B. Machiavelli

C. Machiavelli and Feminism

Chapter 6: Wasty' motions...... 171 A. Anger and Rage B . Resentment C. Bitterness D. Envy E. Despair Conclusion: Revolutionary Morality ...... m.....200 1

CHAPTER 1: IMPARTZALISM, MORAL SAINTLINESS, AND THE INDMDUAL

1 also suppose [as a simplifying assumption] that everyone has physical needs and psychological capacities within the normal range, so that the problems of special health care and of how to treat the mentally defective do not arise. Besides prematurely introducing difficult questions that may take us beyond the theory of justice,

the consideration of these hard cases èan distract our moral perception by leading us to think of people as distant from us whose fate arouses pity and anxiety. Whereas the first problem of justice concerns the relations among those who in the normal course of things are full and active participants in society and directly

or indirectly associated together over the whole course of their life. 1

Morality has been championed for centuries, with some dissenters, as an institution accessible to al1 rational agents. In Moral LuBernard Williams argues that the idea that moral value alone is immune to luck, or matters of

1 John Rawls, "A Kantian conception of EqualityftlPost- s,eds. John Rajchman and Corne1 West (New York: Columbia Press, 1985) 206, my emphasis. 2

chance, is still vgpowerfullyinf luential. @*' ~nlikepersonal or financial success where one requires talent, skill, opportunity, education or benevolent upbringing, the sole condition for moral success is the capacity for moral agency. 3 For this reason, morality is thought to offer "a solace to a sense of the world's ~nfairness.'~~It provides compensation for the misfortunes one suffers in the dog-eat-dog world by king endowed with a supreme kind of importance5: one may have two cents to one's name, be trapped in a menial occupation, dispossessed of one's land, beaten and bloodied by one's lover but can still obtain moral goodness Vhat shines like a jewelw6 for al1 to see; one can humbly accept one's losses and defeats; one can turn the other cheek and forgive one's enemy. In this thesis 1 will examine the llsolace'fof traditional morality and the @@jewelwmany profess it to house. 1 will

Bernard Williams, Moral Lu(Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1981) , p. 20.

Ibid.

4 Ibid., p. 21. 5 Ibid.

6 Immanual Kant, -ork for a Metaphysics of Morah section 394, 8. Kant writes: Vven if it should happen that, owing to special disfavor or fortune, or the niggardly provision of a stepmotherly nature, this will should wholly lack power to accomplish its purpose, if with its greatest efforts it should yet achieve nothing, and there should remain only the good will .. . then, like a jewel, it would still shine by its own light, as a thing which has its whole value in itself~~. 3 argue that traditional conceptions of moral goodness, far from offering a consolation for the worldls smarts and blows, enforce hierarchies that promote these wrongs. Traditional morality is a sham, as if giving the oppressed-those who most need compensation for their sufferings-fake jewelry. In equating virtue with humility, charity and self-sacrifice-- with *nicenessm--traditional moralities serve to keep the oppressed in subordinate, vulnerable positions. In any case, it is not the place of morality to provide a refuge from injustices. Moral value, in keeping with its nature as having special importance for human goodness or human f lourishing, should serve as a tool for human betterment. This approach is, of course, pragmatic, striking a Machiavellian chord with the moral injunction that the end of human betterment justify the means. As this injunction is admittedly vague it calls (commendably in my view) on human resourcefulness. Human goodness can be obtained or promoted in many ways and it is up to each individual to find suitable tools for varied situations. Often this tool will be like a bouquet of flowers, in the form of loving kindness, while at other times it will be like a child version of oneself that one must embrace, in the form of selfishness, or like a fire, in the form of heated rage, or like a needle or knife, in the form of resentment or hate, or even like a gun, in the form of violence. If this ethic seems outrageously relativistic, that is because in one sense it is: the students in the school of 4 moral life are being encouraged to rebel against and reject their ancient, anachronistic master and go off and learn on their own, finding a plenitude of varied goods. In this chapter 1 will explore traditional moral theories, such as the impartialist theories of kantianism and utilitarianism, presenting their strengths but emphasizing their weaknesses. In so doing, 1 will establish the complexity of the task of truly breaking away from impartialist ethics as 1 attempt in future chapters to arrive at a more adequate person-centered moral account that recognizes and stresses the moral importance of social dif ferences between human beings .

A. -tjaliçm: Its Ap~eab

In Contemaorarv. . Will Kymlicka argues that one of the attractions of utilitarianism is that it expresses our intuition that human well-being matters. 7 More specifically, it embodies the general belief held in modern Western society that pain and suffering are bad whereas pleasure and happiness are good. Animal rights activists, like Peter Singer, turn to utilitarianism and its emphasis on sentience in arguing against cruelty toward animals. Concern

. . ' Will Kymlicka, -am ~olitic-~hiloçoabv: OI~ troduc- (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990) 11. Ibid. 5 for members of non-human species symbolizes much that is noble in utilitarianism: its condemation of human selfishness and promotion of other-regarding sentiments. Its demand of impartiality, that each person's happiness count equally in the determination of moral action, that one's own happiness not be accorded more weight than another's, properly identifies human selfishness as a prime contributor to wretched living conditions. Defining the utmost utilitarian concern, Jeremy Bentham states, "Each person is to count for one, and none for more than one. ltg Another attraction of utilitarianism which Kymlicka presents is that it supports our intuition that moral rules should be chosen on the basis of the extent to which they promote human well-being. 10 Utilitarianism can be used to challenge pernicious prejudices. It insists on and safeguards our sense of a distinction between morality and etiquette- that morality involves more than questions of taste or aesthetic reactions. " For example, putting one's elbows on the table while eating is improper or impolite as imposed to immoral (though punishments that are inflicted on some children for such behaviour make one wonder whether there is

9 Jeremy Bentham, &n-Lroduction to me P-les of Innr- and (New York: Hafner hiblishing Co., 1948) 52,

10 Kymlicka, -v Polit&. . Ph- , 11. 11 Ibid. 6 some disagreement about this seemingly obvious distinction). In the usual case, one is not advancing a moral criticism when one says it is rude to rest one's elbows on the table while eating. Putting one's elbows on the table while eating does not cause significantly bad consequences. No one suffers as the result of this behaviour . In contrast , non-consensual sexual activity is the kind of activity that does prompt concern about suffering. People argue that it is morally wrong partially because it produces significantly bad consequences. It is not simply improper in the way that one might daim that consensual sexual activity in a public place is improper. The latter may very well be considered by some as immoral but *ose casting such a judgment must show that it has significantly bad consequences, without simply appealing to legal authority, and thus that it is more than an evaluation based on convention. In this way, utilitarianism, in addressing issues of human well-being and suffering, challenges harmful prejudices and conventions. Although kantianism, another central branch of impartialist ethics, is explicitly non-consequentialist, regarding only the action done from duty as having moral worth, it too expresses a concern for human welfare in its emphasis on altruism. This is particularly evident in the third formulation of the categorical imperative, which states: "Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means.*12 In this formulation, Kant asserts the intrinsic worth of every human being. Acts that are universalizable are ones that have the interests of others at the forefront of the agent's attention. For instance, in his discussion of false promising, Kant claims that one cannot will this act as a universalizable law since it would be treating another as a mere means to ends that the other does not share. Further, his ideal of a kingdom of ends in themselves involves people respecting each other's universalizing wills. As Charles Taylor argues, impartial moral theories like kantianism and utilitarianism provide the conveniences that corne from being "f ormalisms .11" They provide models of valid moral reasoning and enable us to resolve ethical problems without having to engage in the difficult task of having to decide which "of a number of rival languages of moral virtue and vice, of the admirable and the contemptiblew one should invoke in articulating the problems at the onset." In other words, there are certain qualitative distinctions that we conventionally make between actions, thoughts, or what he calls wmodes of lifew by using such terms as higher or lower,

12 Immanuel Kant, for ~etaDhvç-ics of Moralç, trans, Herbert James Paton (New York: Harper & Row, 1964) section 429, 36.

l3 Charles Taylor, Philosor>hv- sciences (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985) 231.

l4 Ibid. 8 noble or base-l5 Questions pertaining to character or moral integrity, which present real stumbling blocks for defining and resolving moral problems, are set aside or bypassed by formalist reductions. For instance, consider that one is deciding whether one should steal unaffordable medication to Save one's dying grandmother. If one subscribes to kantianism one need only think about whether one could will as a universal law the maxim, Whenever one ' s grandmother is dying and needs unaffordable medication to live one should steal it? One has only to picture oneself as a victim of theft to discover that the universal observance of this maxim is undesirable, since, it is supposed, if one were to embrace it one would have to claim, in al1 consistency, that it was morally acceptable for another to steal from us to help their dying grandmother. Similarly, if one adheres to utilitarianism one need only consider whether the action will produce more pleasure than pain. While stealing will certainly promote the pleasure of one's granàmother and of oneself it will cause the pharmacyls owner obvious pain, especially if her store is suffering financially and she has a large family to support or if the theft encourages others to follow suit. If one makes a few simple assumptions, the principle of utility will be seen to dictate that the theft is morally wrong. In using the tools

15 Ibid., 234. 9 of either moral theory to define and resolve the moral dilemma, one need not think about whether the kind of life to which the theft contributes, where the theft is an expression of a deep persona1 commitment, is admirable or contemptible. With formalisms one can escape this complication. For Taylor, there are three types of morally relevant considerations. The first is expressed in the notion of utility, that what produces happiness is preferable to what produces pain. 16 The second is what he calls "the universal attribution of personality,~~" the notion that in moral reasoning everyone counts, and thus is the source of moral imperatives which Kant affirms. Moral imperatives often conflict with dictates of utilitarianism, as when equality of distribution is at odds with maximization of utility: dividing up scarce food equally, where everyone is still hungry or dividing the food up unequally, where a few are satisfied at the expense of many left unfed. Some of these conflicts can be resolved by appealing to the third kind of consideration that Taylor identifies as morally relevant (though regarded as no less important than the other two), namely, that which is expressed when we invoke languages of qualitative contrast to ref er to various goals, pro jects and commitments. For example, in the quotation at the beginning of the chapter from

. .- - 16 Ibid., 244.

17 Ibid., 244. 10 John Rawls the word "normalm may be seen to function as a word of qualitative contrast to resolve, however spuriously, the conflict between considering everyone when discussing matters

of justice and considering only a certain group of people, those with %ormalW physical needs and psychological capacities . In maintaining that l'the mentally def ectivet* should be ignored when considering issues of justice, because their fate I1arouses pity and anxiety,It he makes the assumption that their lives are qualitatively inferior, less worthy of respect, than the lives of %0rma1,~ "full and active

participants in society .It In assuming that the moral is a single consistent domain, with a single kind of good, based on a single kind of consideration, Taylor claims, fonnalisms ignore the complexity of moral living. 18 They side-step the problem of determining which or which combination of the three kinds of ethical considerations has the greatest validity or priority in reasoning about a variety of cases and issues.

Some of the attractions of impartialist ethics, in particular, its conveniences, give a hint about its less appealing aspects. A straightforward, reliable and efficient 11 method that resolves moral problems in a remarkably tidy way would seem to originate from a preoccupation with control.

Indeed, several philosophers (Card 1993, Hoagland 1988, Miller 1992) claim that contractarian and utilitarian ethics are wholly bent on control. As these argue, they present formal and impersonal relationships and the fonns of obligation and responsibility with which they are associated as paradigmatic for moral living.lg Drawn from the predominantly male worlds of law and commerce, the kind of agent impartialism endorses is an ideal aàministrator excelling in supervision, management, accountability and answerability. He responds promptly to demands and manages conflicting ones, al1 the while surveying his behaviour from the standpoint of a lucid observer who knows what is wrong and why. If he acts improperly, he knows he must answer for it, take the blame that is due, and make amends toward restoring the balance in the relation his conduct has disturbed. As for his morally correct actions, these are al1 part of a good dayls work, and the credit they confer resides in the rnere knowledge of having done them. Since the administrative or "legislative agent," as

l9 Claudia Card, I1Gender and Moral Luck, =tv, O-, eds. Owen Flanagan and Amelie Oksenberg Rorty (Cambridge, Massuchusetts: The MIT Press, 1993) 209. 12 Richard Miller calls him," will be primarily occupied with maximizing happy outcornes or paying homage to the moral law, he will not be concerned with the kind of individual (self or other) his actions promote. This is in keeping with Taylor's claim that impartialist moral theories have no place for languages of qualitative contrast. However, as Taylor notes, in so far as they hold 'the rational' as "the basis of moral admiration and contemptIn as "a goal worthy of respect," they presuppose that the perfect kantian or utilitarian agent is morally admirable. 21 Several philosophers have been troubled by the kind of individual that contractarian and utilitarian ethics endorse. Richard Taylor, for instance, refers to kantian agents as

'*dry, ephemeral, abstract, husks of human beingsw ,22 recalling from Jonathan Swift's GyLliverls hav- the imaginary race of horses, Houyhnhnms, who live almost entirely by reason. This dissatisfaction is typically articulated in conjunction with the criticism that impartialism does not accord any value, moral or other, to persona1 goods.

2 0 Richard Miller, Moral Differences (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1992). 21 Charles Taylor, mlosomv am the Human Sciences, 244 . 22 Richard Taylor, introduction, On the ~s&s of or-, by Arthur Schopenhauer, trans. E. F. J. Payne (Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc.) xix. Bernard Williams argues extensively that the requirement of kantianism and utilitarianism that the agent treat everyone as equal, without showing special consideration for those close to him, undermines the importance of individual commitments in moral experience. 23 The agent is asked to set aside his own values and projects, to abstract from his concrete personality, relations and situation, and perform that action which maximizes happiness, in the case of utilitarianism, or that which expresses a universal law of nature, in the case of kantianism. These commitments count no more in his moral calculations than the commitments of the large number of people upon whom his actions have bearing. In considering utilitarianism, in particular, Williams writes: IwHis own decisions as a utilitarian agent are a function of al1 the satisfactions which he can affect from where he is; and this means that the projects of others, to an indeterminately great extent, detemine his decision. lwz4 If working extra hours for Childrenws Aid would cause a greater increase in the general happiness, then, from a strictly utilitarian viewpoint, this is what one ought to do. Other

23 Bernard Williams, IwA Critique of UtilitarianismIW

a r and A-, eds. J.J.C. Smart and Bernard Williams (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993) 108- 118. 14 commitments, like those to friends and family or those to groups of which one is a member, will need to be seen alongside this commitment to children. The decision to side with the former kind of commitment will have to be envisioned as on a par with the obviously irrational decision of a rescue team to try to Save only one person in a shipwreck instead of several. To regard the commitment to reduce the suffering of children as secondary to one's other commitments would mean failing to assume the distanced perspective of the rescue team . It would mean selfish concern with one's own preservation--saving oneself-to the neglect of the preservation of others. That commitments apart from a commitment to children will invariably weaken as a result is simply an unfortunate offshoot of the utilitarian vision of satisfactions in no significant relation to the individuals who have them. In this sense, those left at the wayside by the utilitarian calculus, acquaintances and loved alike, are mere casualties. The individual too is a casualty if his action goes against his own interests and he is reduced to an object for utilitarian ends. Williams mites: "Utilitarianism has a tendency ... to leave a vast hole in the range of human desires, between egoistic inclinations and necessities at one end, and impersonally benevolent happiness-management at the 15 ~ther.'~~~Basically, the agent is emptied of al1 his projects and commitments to make room for the vast utilitarian endeavour of maximizing the interests of all. The rational subsumes and absorbs the emotional, producing an individual who is kind to others not because he cares for them and is concerned about their welfare but because ais is an effective way to promote the greatest happiness, though admittedly the two do not exclude each other. Similarly, from a kantian perspective, if a lie will stop a loved one from going to prison, still it is not permissible. It would not only undermine the institution of truth-telling but also treat otherç as mere means instead of laws unto themselves. How the agent's attitudes and projects bear on the situation at hand is not considered relevant; nor are the attitudes and projects of anyone else. As Richard Taylor claims, the categorical imperative does not ask us "to consider how these other rational beings , thus bound, might feel about our maxims. It is thus Reason that counts. It is not the living and suffering human beings, who manage sometimes to be reasonable, but most of the time n0t.11~~In Kan't theory, the union between the rational and moral is complete. The sole action that has moral worth is that which is done out of pure respect for the moral law; no

2 5 Ibid., 112. 2 6 Richard Taylor, introduction, xviii. 16 accompanying benevolent or sympathetic motive has moral value.

In llMoral Susan Wolf explores the criticism that impartialist moral theories do not assign any value to persona1 goods, defending the view that the perfect kantian or utilitarian agent, whom she calls a "moral saint," embodies rather unattractive persona1 ideals-kantian saint: ?*asaint out of duty;ll utilitarian saint: "a saint out of 10ve.~'~ Moral saintliness, she mites, is not a state toward which it is llparticularlyrational or good or desirable for a human being to strive .lw2' Advancing views similar to those of Williams, she claims that the moral saint may jeopardize her own well-being. If an individual possesses al1 the moral virtues to an extreme degree, it is practically impossible for her to have more than a few nonmoral virtues, traits we admire or take pleasure in which have no role in the constitution of moral saintliness. 30 For instance, a theatrical flair is not

27 Susan Wolf, "Moral Saints, " Journal 79 (1982) 418-439- Ibid., 421. Ibid. , 419. Incidentally, Gulliver decides this too at the end of his travels, maintaining that the life of the Houyhnhnms is undesirable for human beings. Ibid. , 17 something that a moral saint can comfortably promote within herself for practical reasons, " Moral saintliness involves, at the least, extreme concern for the welfare of others so that any kind of behaviour that calls attention to oneself can only undermine this aspect. Further, for more profound reasons a theatrical flair is inimical to moral saintliness. This sort of trait requires that one adopt a flippant attitude toward the imperfections of the world. But this is precisely the kind of attitude the moral saint must not have, given her serious commitment toward improving the world." While she might enjoy films in which this attitude predominates, too much enjoyment of these, to the point where they became her favourite type of film, would suggest that she had more than a little first-hand familiarity with flippancy and cause us to wonder about the true extent of her moral saintlinesse Though Wolf rej ects moral saintliness as expressing a persona1 ideal toward which we should al1 aspire, she, nonetheless, does not condemn the moral saint. She concludes that the fact that impartialist ethical theories do not give any value to persona1 goods so that the perfect kantian or utilitarian agent would be in some way flawed, or lack some desirable human Eeatures, does not indicate a need for a revision of the intramoral content of the theories themselves.

31 Ibid., 421-422. '' cf. Wolf, ibid., 422. 18 In response to the problems impartialist ethics presents in neglecting the personal, she maintains that there are two points of view for comprehensively evaluating human lives, and distinguishes between the moral point of view and a non-moral point of view which she calls l'the point of view of individual perfection. lw3' On her view, there are good reasons for people not to strive to become moral saints. The life of the moral saint is only one good kind of life for a person to have; there is also the life of the artist, the scholar, the athlete, etc, and these will Vary in terms of the amount of moral goodness they can incorporate without changing in their basic essentials. Thus, on Wolf's account, Mothsr Teresa will rate higher on the scale of moral perfection than, Say, Jodie

Foster, biit on the scale of individual perfection the ratings will be less clear. These will depend on how we assess the various traits constituting moral saintliness, strictly moral traits, like altruism, and traits found even in the most immoral of people, like patience and determination. Wolf considers the possibility that her claims might be taken to support an Arhtotelian or Nietzschean approach toward moral philosophy, which would involve broadening and revising the character traits that have been traditionally viewed as moral virtues and vices." On a Nietzschean account,

33 Ibid., 437. 34 Ibid., 433. 19 Mother Teresa does not approximate an independent, objective standard of moral perfection but, rather, a group of traits have been singled out as morally relevant and Mother Teresa embodies them to an extreme extent. Further, Mother Teresa would be seen in a very negative light, as supporting a slave- morality, Christian convention that values traits that are associated with the oppressed: patience, humility , self- abnegation. She would be viewed as morally inferior to great artists who raise themselves above conventional expectations and create themselves anew through their art. This is in keeping with Nietzsche's belief that creativity as well as traits traditionally considered moral vices, such as vanity- perhaps necessary for great art--figure into one's moral personality . Wolf, however, rejects an alternative approach to moral philosophy because she claims that No matter how flexible we make the guide to conduct which we choose to label 'morality,' no matter how rich we make the life in which perfect obedience to this guide would result, we will have reason to hope that a person does not wholly rule and direct his life by the abstract and impersonal consideration that such a life would be morally good. 35 This assessrnent of a Nietzschean approach to morality,

3 5 Ibid., 434, emphasis mine. 20 however, with its emphasis on obedience and abstract considerationç, is based on the very criteria that a Nietzschean approach rejects . In assuming the concerns of impartialism to be primary in defining the moral sphere, it begs the question for a particular approach toward moral philosophy, and assumes that morality is at bottom a single consistent domain solely concerned with impersonal goods like obligation. It begs the question for the person whose life overflows with fulfilled moral obligations as the model moral individual. Wolf needs to provide more of a defense for the particular view of morality she is advocating and show more convincingly why the undesirability of a perfect kantian or perfect utilitarian agent does not really indicate a need to consider other moral goods besides impersonal ones. That there is only one model of moral perfection, which the morally dutiful exemplify, is far from obvious. For this reason, it is not clear why, as Wolf claims, "it would be absurd to deny" that Mother Teresa is morally better than Jane Austen or Katherine Hepburn. 36 Even if one adopts standard utilitarian means of assessrnent for determining the respective moral worths of Mother Teresa and, Say, Jane

Austen, it may be that Jane Austen cornes out the morally superior. For instance, one could argue that although Mother Teresa helped many in her life-project of tending the sick and

36 Ibid., 432. 21 hungry, in her selflessness she perpetuated oppressive stereotypes of female goodness which keep women in subjugated positions. Since for centuries women have ben told that they are naturally suited for selfless endeavours like caretaking, in which they serve others, the argument could go that Jane Austen, by way of her intellectual and artistic excellence, contributed to the liberation of women. Thus although her life-project is not directly altruistic, unlike that of Mother Teresa, and it is doubtful that she had the interests of other women uppermost in her mind in pursuing literary writing, nonetheless, the argument could go, on utilitarian grounds her literary accomplishments could be seen as having more moral worth. The fact that judging the respective moral worths of Mother Teresa and Jane Austen by utilitarian standards does not guarantee replicable results indicates that basing moral judgments on ethical considerations besides that of utility is almost inevitable. Wolf, in referring to Mother Teresa as "morally bettern than Jane Austen, makes a qualitative contrast, evaluating their respective moral characters. And in terms of this sort of ethical criterion, it should be noted that Mother Teresa may also not prove to be the morally superior. Critics of Motber Teresa argue that in maintaining that the sick and dying should accept their fate and rejecting the use of modern treatments and diagnostic techniques the alleged saint engaged in far from praiseworthy behaviour. 22 They also maintain that in befriending criminals and right- wing political leaders, and allowing herself to be photographed with them, she lent support to values that contribute to the very existence of a lowest stratum of "the poorest of the poor" which she tended so humbly and f aithfully .''

Whereas Wolf does not take issue with traditional moral standards themselves, and simply maintains that there are two points of view for comprehensively evaluating human lives, Miller rejects the idea of a point of view of individual perfection and argues that traditional moral standards themselves are too demanding. 3 8 On his view, morality is decisive and complete with respect to questions concerning the kinds of lives that are good. The fact that the perfect kantian or utilitarian agent would not be altogether admirable indicates serious flaws in kantianism and utilitarianism. In contrast to Wolf, Miller adopts an alternative approach toward morality, which he refers to as Ilperson-centered, claiming that he makes a "radical breaku from impartialist, or

. '' Christopher Hitchens, The msj O-y Pas1t1on:. MO- Teresa in Theorv and Practioe (London: Verso, 1997).

38 Richard Miller, Diff ~rew(Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1992). 23

"legislative, ethics. " His account is interesting, ironically, to the extent that it does not entai1 a break with impartialist ethics but rather a reconciliation with it. While Miller gives due weight to the fact that in ordinary moral deliberation unequal consideration toward particular people and projects is unavoidable he continues to subscribe to "the truthsrr found in legislative ethics regarding the constituents of moral respon~ibility.~~It will be shown that a radical break from the impartialist approach can only be achieved by challenging the so-called truths which legislative ethics affords and thus Miller's concept of a morally responsible person that is substantially derived from them. Miller's position will be explored in considerable detail since it is highly coherent, systematic and clear and thus lends itself well to the project of identifying problems with traditional understandings of moral wrongness. In maintaining that impartialist moral theories misrepresent the demands of morality, Miller appeals to a proviso of authenticity to protect us against excessive moral demands. This is the proviso that one need not meet demands that are felt as externa1 to oners character in order to behave morally. On Miller's view, more of a moral trait does not necessarily make one a morally better person. In contrast

3 9 Ibid., 366.

4 O Ibid., 367. 24 to Wolf, he claims that a person who is extremely benevolent is not necessarily morally better than one who is only moderately benevolent. He gives the example of nreformedn Scrooge and B1super-reformedwScrooge, maintaining that the latter, unlike the former, manages with his extra-goodness to redeem his earlier super-stinginess. He argues that we would not tend to judge the super-reformed as morally superior to the reformed Scrooge, seeing this type of judgment as combining "the worst of the world religions, the glorification of self-denial, with the worst of modern advertising, the principle that more is better. (However, he does admit that if we were told that super-reformed Scroogefs heroic effort to do good is entirely successful, so that he contributes more to the general welfare than does reformed Scrooge, we would deem him the morally better.) In response to the objection that the proviso of authenticity would seem to be too permissive, Miller maintains that there are noms everyone should consult in determining the sort of person one should be, morally speaking." The morally responsible person is, or must be, at least to some minimal degree sensitive, generous and flexible4): she must be decent. Thus, for instance, an all-around cruel person, on 25 Miller's account, simply could not be said to be the sort of person she should be, morally speaking. 4 4 In txying to reconcile the person-centered approach with certain ggtruthsw in the impartialist approach, iller would seem to rely on two notions of moral wrongness, one of which he calls tgperson- centeredw and another which might be called "culture- centered." The latter receives its legitimacy from Western moral tradition and is expressed in Miller's belief that there are certain noms of behaviour to which everyone should adhere. Since his account of morality is essentially person- centered the first notion of moral wrongness ultimately determines whether a given action is wrong or not. The second notion of moral wrongness serves as a check for the first and refers to minimal requirements that must be met for a person to qualify as a morally responsible agent. For instance, Miller asks us to consider the case of Phi1 the pharmacist who enjoys his wife and children to the point of being distracted from his work so that in several instances he acts negligently toward customers, such as failing to check his answering machine. He argues that although Phil's negligence is wrong, "if he can decide not to change, without moral defect, then the minimization requirement does not describe the sort of person he should try to be.~~' According 26 to this rather complex assertion, Phi1 need not become more detached in his commitments toward his wife and children in order to avoid wrongdoing at work if in self-assessment he determines that his commitment to his family is of such a strength that it precludes an equally strong commitment toward strangers. Because he is so generous when it cornes to his family he cannot be as generous toward strangers. Philus failure to check his answering machine is wrong according to the culture-centered view of wrongess as such negligence harms others. But since, Miller argues, this negligence is Inan amiable instancet1"of the wrongness of wrongdoing to which he is prone, w46 it is ultimately not wrong. Miller tries to make us find morally acceptable Phil's choice not to change by claiming that the change would make him "more of a detached w~rkaholic,~~~'something which strikes us immediately as undesirable. But either a person is or is not a workaholic; workaholism only admits of degrees once a minimum point has been reached, 15 hours/day for instance, after which one can be more or less a workaholic. And Phil, in becoming less engrossed in his attachments toward his wife and children so that he will not be negligent in his work duties and harm others in a way that does them no good, is not thereby becoming Ilmore of a detached workaholicN: he is simply

4 6 Ibid., 383,

47 Ibid., 381, 27 meeting the demands of his work. ~hecking the answering machine is hardly comparable to the extra hours of work associated with king a workaholic. In claiming that because Phi1 loves immensely his wife and children he can decide to remain relatively indifferent toward strangers without moral defect, Miller makes the unjustified asçumption that love necessarily involves a very great amount of time with those loved . ~imilarly, iller writes , "Even if an exceptionally irritable and shy person could, by straining every nerve, be a generous and sensitive person, it might be excessive to insist that he should try to be a generous and sensitive person."" However, a person who is exceptionally irritable and shy is not, as a matter of course, locked into these traits, so that attempts to be generous and sensitive would result in physical damage (strained nerves). By remaining shy and exceptionally irritable he is harming others and himself, hindering the development of good social relationships toward no good ends. Not only would it seem better if Phil and the excessively shy and irritable person changed but morally required that they change in order to become truly morally responsible people. Earlier Miller describes an incident in which he acted insensitively: I10nce, when a friend called to give me

4 8 Ibid., 382. 28 directions to her father-in-lawts funeral, 1 worried out loud, for longer than 1 should have, whether 1 could f ind time to corne,~t~~Of this incident Miller admits he could have acted more sensitively but claims that since he wasnqt wildly insensitive, he "did not do wrong.~~' On the basis of Miller% own account, his failure to act sensitively toward his friend is wrong but he is not wrong not to alter the trait from which this wrongdoing proceeds. In other words, when Miller lets himself become so absorbed in his own projects that he acts insensitively toward a friend, his failure to control his behaviour is wrong. But this does not mean that he would be wrong not to alter the underlying attachments. On Miller's view, in terms of the culture-centered notion of wrongness 1 described his behaviour is wrong, whereas in terms of the person-centered notion of wrongness, his behaviour is not wrong. He is simply a person who enjoys too much having a full plate, and it is too demanding to insist that he give this enjoyment up. Again, it would seem here that not only would it have been better for Miller not to have acted as he did but that in so acting he did in fact behave irresponsibly. While he was not wildly insensitive, it could be argued, he was not even minimally sensitive and thus failed to live up to his moral responsibilities. The harm he inflicted on his

4 9 Ibid., 376.

Ibid., 377. 29 friend, however small, seems undeniable, and warrants what moral wrongs usually warrant: a heartfelt apology. In his concern with getting us off some too high moral hook, and keeping our moral expectations close to the ground, Miller would seem not to demand from us enough. His concept of a morally responsible person is at once too narrow and too permissive. Because Miller maintains two different notions of moral wrongness, he finds himself in the awkward position of, on the one hand, upholding traditional morality, in relying on a culture-centered notion of wrongness, while, on the other, keeping us from excessive moral demands and thus justifying and pardoning action that falls short of these demands. Thus he is led to make the rather complicated claim regarding the example involving himself presented earlier that he "did not do wrongm though he was clearly insensitive. The unappeal of the perfect kantian or utilitarian notwithstanding, the kind of individual Miller puts forth, however unwittingly, would seem hardly admirable. This is the sort of person who says that if she were a generous person she would give more of her tirne to others but since she is selfish and bad-tempered she can without moral def ect limit herself to self-centered pursuits. In trying to present a more acceptable account of morality than that of legislative ethics, it is not enough simply to address the moral standards that legislative ethics upholds and argue for less excessive ones. The extreme 30 demands that traditional morality makes on us arise from several questionable assumptions which need to be challenged in order to depart radically from legislative ethics. Consider again the moral saint. Wolf argues that a moral saint is barred from having a cynical sense of humour because this would involve an attitude of resignation and pessimism toward the imperfections of the world. She claims that a moral saint, in contrast, would maintain an attitude of cheerful optimism, always keeping the basic goodness of others utmost in her mind. ~ertainly, if the case were otherwise, it would be difficult for her not to lose faith in her manic moral activity, since if others are not basically good, or cannot be redeened, there would be little reason to pay so much attention to their happiness. This would be moral masochism at its worst. A moral saint, as Wolf claims, would have to be Wery, very nice", 52 never hurting, never causing offense: Ilpatient, considerate, even-tempered, hospitable, charitable in thought as well as in deed.~~' For Wolf, striving for moral perfection, for being as morally good as possible, thus does not only involve leading a life that is relatively lacking in non-moral goods but the beliefs that niceness is always best, that a flawless existence is most

...... " Wolf, ibid., 422. '' Wolf, ibid., 423. 5 3 Wolf, ibid., 421. desirable, and that behaviour that harms is morally wrong. Miller does not challenge any of these assumptions and argues only that we are not morally required to meet excessively high moral standards and become moral saints. We can strive for a less than flawless existence; it is al1 right not to be nice al1 the tirne, He continues to assume that being as morally good as one can means being as nice and as flawless as one can. He writes, "It is not the case, morally speaking, that one should strive for the maximum, but one should admire the maximum.1154 There is no questioning in Miller's account, just as in Wolf's, that the morally superior could entai1 anything but traditional moral traits. For

Miller, just as some people are better basketball players than others, some people are simply better at morality than others. One should not be unsatisfied with oneself if, lacking the necessary physique and dedication, one remains an amateur athlete; neither should one be ashamed for being less than maximally moral due to one's other interests and commitments. But there is something wrong with this thinking. The capacity for generosity, for instance, is not like the capacity for basketball or, to refer to an example Miller gives, like the capacity for classic Italian cooking,55 in that it seems to have little to do with physique or talent in any

54 Miller, ibid., 386, emphasis mine. 55 Lbid., 386. 32 direct way. If one lacks the requisite height and fine-tuned physical CO-ordination, al1 the practice and coaching in the world will not make one a first-rate basketball player. Cutting back on one% other commitments will have no effect. The difference with generosity is that one's other interests and attachments are deeply relevant in terms of how generous a person one will be. In the case of Phi1 the pharmacist, it would seem that Phi1 is not that interested in the welfare of others apart from his family; meeting the demands of his work so that others do not suffer needlessly would seem at best a cursory acknowledgment of their needs but it is an acknowledgment that he does not make. If he can very easily be distracted from his work duties so that he unavoidably harms others, it would seem that he does not know what it is to be tmly interested in the welf are of non-intimates. Phil1s Vamily-based negligencel' is not, as Miller claims, "an amiable instancen of "the wrongness of wrongdoingI1 to which Phi1 is proneS6--a remark that praises more than condones. It is, rather, a clear instance of selfishness, and a greater interest in the welfare of strangers is unlikely to be as difficult to acquire as more height. In regarding the leading of a moral life as a matter of following interna1 noms of character while abiding by certain 33 culture-centered norms, Miller leaves unaddressed factors underlying these two types of norms: with regard to the second, as suggested earlier , the assumption that moral correctness and decency are interchangeable, with regard to the first, the assumption that radical self-assessment is not a moral requirement. His person-centered account of morality is similar to Bernard Williams' account of morality. williams writes : We are subject to the mode1 that what one can do sets limits to deliberation, and that character is revealed by what one chooses within those limits, among the things that one can do. But character ... is equally revealed in the location of those limits .... Incapacities can not only set limits to character and provide conditions of it, but can also partly constitute its substance. 57 For Miller and Williams, one both discovers and creates one's character through one's actions as well as through one's inactions. Having moral integrity means having a set of unconditional commitments, the discrimination to determine their boundaries, and the self-regulation to ensure that they are expressed and defended in one's conduct. Miller writes: Part of [the project of self-assessment] is the effort to act in ways that express who one is, rather than responding to demands that one experiences as external.

57 Williams, Moral Luck, 130. 34 One does not want to engage in behaviour that one does not own, psychologically speaking, even if one approves of that behaviour .,., The proviso of authenticity .., requires discrimination, discrimination which cannot be

reduced to a formula, to determine these limits. 58 Both Miller and Williams fail to recognize that moral living is not simply a matter of grasping certain traits and regulating oneself in accordance with them. Some selves are simply not worth preserving . Though Miller explicitly addresses this concern with his claim that there are some traits, like generosity (though not utmost benevolence), that everyone should pursue as a necessary condition for moral living, these are at once too limiting and too permissive of the kinds of lives we should lead, To explain this paradox, in terms of Miller's account, we cannot become brutal criminals but we can become insensitive citizens, conforming to 'the right rules' without ever engaging in radical self- assessment and remaining oblivious to any harm-producing effects of our deeply cherished values and commitments. Miller makes no moral demand of radical self-assessment, which involves critically evaluating one's deeply held beliefs that are strongly informed by convention and prejudice. In this kind of assessment one s understanding of reality is challenged and one no longer takes conventions for granted.

58 Richard Miller, Moral Lm, 383. 35 Providing an example of radical self-assessment, Victoria Davion mites: "Before becoming a feminist, one might have seen the institution of marriage as a good thing for women generally, but now one sees it as dangerous to women. 8w59 With this re-assessment, one may no longer value marriage as a persona1 project and may even decide to form erotic attachments with women rather than with men.

In some ways Martha Nussbaum% work on moral philosophy goes beyond that of Miller. She shows that the superficiality of legislative morality, its neglect of the quality of character its content endorses, is a function of its simplicity . On her view, legislative morality promotes not merely a particular kind of individual--the moral saint--but, correlatively, a flawless form of existence where no one commits a wrong, breaks a rule or causes harm. 60 Stressing the harmony, consistency and order which a morally perfect world requires, she claims, like Wolf, that the moral saint would try to alleviate conflict at any cost, and that such efforts

59 victoria Davion, "Integrity and ~adicalChange, t* =wr ed. Claudia Card (Lawrence; Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1991) 184.

6 0 Martha Nussbaum, I;ove I a mwledae: Fissavs on teraturs (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990) 126. 36 are not necessarily morally good. In contrast to Miller, she challenges the view that moral goodness is simply a matter of being as nice and as flawless as one can be. She gives the example of Maggie in Henry Jamest -en Rowl who aspires toward moral perfection. Maggie, in her desire to be without flaw, tries to keep her relationship with her father completely unchanged after she becomes married to the Prince. This is impossible as for several years Maggie has more or less occupied the role of wife to her father, acting as his sole cornpanion. But Maggie is determined and cuts back on the claims of marriage, restraining herself sexually to her husband to whom she is intensely attracted so that she can still be her fatherls undivided. 61 Nussbaum argues through this example that Maggiels pursuit of moral simplicity involves an aesthetic attitude toward persons that is passive and detached. This attitude is informed by the fact that works of art are independent sources of value which maintain their value regardless of whether we are engaged in appreciating them. They do not require our continual, active admiration- We can attend to one art work and then another without the sense that the objects make conflicting claims upon our devotion. 62 Nussbaum mites: ItIf one day 1 spend my entire museum visit gazing at Turners, I

61 Ibid., 126.

62 Ibid., 132. 37 have not incurred guilt against the Blakes in the next room. Accordingly, if one sees persons in a similar way, one can focus on one person and then another while experiencing the various claims they make on one's care as non-conflicting, where one meets some claims and ignores others. Thus one incurs no risk of disloyalty, infidelity or cruelty. The moral saint can most easily enjoy the sense that people do not make conflicting claims against one's care simply because, as seen earlier, being maniacally benevolent, she will have few, if any, deep persona1 attachments. (It is certainly not coincidental that she is best suited for fulfilling the demands of legislative morality. For the moral saint, cases about saving intimates versus saving strangers simply do not pose dilemmas.) But as the moral saint is hardly the typical human being, for the common run of humanity acquainted with deep intimacy, conflicts of duties are very real. mile the life of moral purity is overflowing with niceness it has its own brand of cruelty. As Ne1 Noddings writes, "To be always apart in human affairs, a critical and sensitive observer, to remain troubled but uncommitted, to be just so much affected or affected in just such a way, is to lose the ethical in the aestheti~,~'~~In remaining a bit

. 64 Ne1 Noddings, -a: A-st . to Et- Mo- Mo- (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984) 22. 38 emotionally detached from the prince, in never fully committing herself to him, Maggie inadvertently injures him. Likewise, in persisting as her fatherts undivided companion she keeps him from forming beneficent attachments with other adults. Her blindness to the conflicting claimç of the Prince and her father is partially a cause, partially a result, of this cruelty. It affords her a safe world and an innocence which is essentially a fona of self-denial. As Nussbaum argues, in order to become a "separate woman in her own rightw and experience fully a different, perhaps more complicated love, she needs to cause her father pain, to embark on a journey beyond the safe world of traditional morality and its rules of never hurting, which the moral saint follows scrupulously, meeting every obligation. 6 5 She needs to discover more livable moral ideals which recognize an unavoidable place for pain, for failing in duties, in the obtaining of certain goods. Nussbaumls account serves to show that kantianism and utilitarianism, in their denial of individual difierences and insistence on simplicity, are in the end Voo good for their own good. " Their narrow conception of moral behaviour, as solely that which conforms to the principle of utility or is done purely out of a sense of duty or respect for the moral law, does not promote the full embracing of suf fering, the

65 Ibid., 129. growth of other-regarding feeling, and respect for human beings in terms of their individual needs, values and projects. As suggested by the discussion of Maggie in Zhe Golden Boa, impartialist morality is less about respect for human beings in their separateness and distinctness, human beings qua human beings, than about maintaining a conflict- free existence where one can avoid pain and suffering by cutting back and cutting down commitmentç, acting much like a bulldozer deflecting obstacles in the construction of a smooth, even road. But while Nussbaum recognizes that moral living necessarily involves certain kinds of messiness, where harm is unavoidable-where one simply camot be always 'saintly' while pursuing with full sincerity one's commitments--she does not in the end reject an aestheticizotion of persons in the moral sphere, and merely puts forth one that "never fails to conceive its objects as alive, as in need, as having clai- to press. w66 On her view , the fine-tuned perception and openness of feeling characteristic of aesthetic attention is characteristic of ethical attention. Just as in aesthetic engagement one silences the self's ever-pressing concerns so also in ethical engagement does one focus solely on the object at hand. She writes, The comparison of our relations with a person to Our

6 6 Ibid. , 147. 40 relations with a work of art show us a way in which ethical attention might have fine-tuned perception and responsive feeling, while remaining free of the persona1 resentment, rage, and jealousy that too frequently characterize our persona1 dealings. 67 Iris Murdoch, who also emphasizes loving perception as essential to moral endeavour, similarly writes: The love which brings the right answer is an exercise of justice and realism and really looking. The difficulty is to keep the attention fixed upon the real situation and to prevent it from returning surreptitiously to the self with consolations of self-pity, resentment, fantasy and despair. 68 It is uncertain, however, whether strong negative motions like resentment, rage and jealousy, which propel the self's wants and desires, necessarily cloud ethical attention or jeopardize a loving attitude. It may be possible and sometimes morally desirable to attain the disinterestedness characteristic of aesthetic engagement without quelling the self's irnpassioned concerns. As Frye claims, a loving perspective does not require self-denial but a knowledge of the boundaries of the self, of one's interests and desires (positive and negative), where one knows "what is and is not

67 Ibid., 146. 68 Iris Murdoch, TheGood (London: Routledge and & Kegan Paul, 1980) 91, emphasis in original. determined by these.

G. and D-te Reflectj~n

Consider the example Murdoch gives of a mother, whom she calls W, and her daughter-in-law, whom she calls "D.~~~~M initially finds D "pert and familiar, insufficiently ceremonious, brusque, sometimes positiveïy nide, always tiresomely j~venile.~~"Further she does not like "Dts accent or the way D dresses.#172In other words, M is a snob: she feels "ber son has married beneath him.~'~~But M, "who is a very #correctt person" hides her real opinion toward the young wo~uan.~' As time passes M becomes very distressed by what she perceives to be an unfortunate match and detemines to look again at D to reassess her merits. After engaging in ' just and lovingt attention, M discovers D to be "net vulgar but refreshingly simple, not undignified, but spontaneous, not noisy but gay, not tiresomely juvenile but delightfully

69 Marilyn Frye, The Politics. . of Realitv: E, Theory (Freedom, California: The Crossing Press, 1983) 75. Ibid. , Ibid., Ibid. ,

73 Ibid., 17.

74 Ibid., 17. 42 youthf~l.1g'~ M cornes to see D in what would appear to be the 'nicestg possible way.

But while it is loving of M to overcome her hostility toward D and value ber as a member of her family, it is questionable whether it is loving of her to see D in a way that would seem to romanticize the latter's lack of education and sexist upbringing. Seeing D from the new perspective may mise less from altruism than from self-interest, since in so doing she escapes several distresses: seeing her son in an unfortunate marriage; feeling inadequate for not loving her son's choice of life partner; apprehending social inequalities which would challenge her sense of inborn superiority . Needless to Say, M1s appreciation of qualities that have their origin in oppressive social structures is unlikely to draw attention to these social structures. This is not to deny that one can consistently perceive D in a positive light and recognize social injustices, but this is not the kind of case

Murdoch presents. M does not reason that D1s traits are a function of her lack of social opportunities and that it would be unfair and ungenerous to harbour ill-feeling toward D over factors for which she is not responsible. Rather, she attributes her initial negative judgment wholly to faults within herself: "1 am old-fashioned and conventional. I may be prejudiced and narrow-minded. 1 may be snobbish. f am

75 Ibid. , 18 . 43 certainly jealous .w76 Murdoch's example suggests, contrary to its intent, that (loving) calm ref lection is not necessarily suif icient for proper ethical response since it may be that the general world-view governing one's perception of individual realities needs to be challenged. A question like Whould I devote myself entirely to my husband, children and home or pursue a professional career?" cannot be addressed impartially simply by putting aside considerations that would be considered selfish since in a sexist society, which relegates domestic tasks to women, the first option naturally commands more support. M's general world-view may be seen as involving a conception of human character as made up of conventional beliefs, prejudices, inborn traits like good-heartedness, and traits specific to social class, such as dignity, a trait, it could be argued, she initially sees as not belonging to members of the working-class. Her perspective attributes no significant constitutive function to deeply oppressive social institutions. One might think that M does in fact challenge this vision when she changes her belief that D is undignified. But this change is not far-reaching, and only self-reflective, based on a belief that aspects of her own personality, some of which she regards as products of her social class and

76 Ibid., 17. 44 upbringing, are causing her to attribute ta D negative traits. Since M is able to revise her view of D without examining closely social inequalities that have contributed to some of D's traits, traits M initially found undesirable, she feels no anger regarding these inequalities. And since she has no sense of the unfairness of things, no feeling of outrage that D was denied opportunities unjustly, she cannot embrace D whole-heartedly, with full acceptance and without illusions. She simply substitutes a different picture of DI one that romanticizes D's traits. Seeing D as a kind of noble peasant serves to gloss over the ugliness associated with economic oppression, thereby promoting the interests of Mvs social class and safeguarding her privileges. It is not insignificant that, in emphasizing dispassionate reflection in her account of moral endeavour, Murdoch presents examples of dilemmas where one can engage in such reflection, where persons can be conceived as kinds of art objectç. She writes: Should a retarded child be kept at home or sent to an institution? Should an elderly relation who is a trouble-

maker be cared for or asked to go away? Should an unhappy marriage be continued for the sake of the children?

Should 1 neglect them in order to practice my art?77 Al1 of these cases cal1 for the exercise of calm reason and

7 7 Ibid., 91, emphasis in original. 45 are not such that they require on-the-spot solutions. Now consider the following dilemma: %hould a woman hann her husband to stop him from violently beating their daughter or cal1 the police and wait for them to corne?" In a situation like this there is no tirne for "really 10oking;~'~ one's look must be like a bolt of lightening, penetrating the situation in a flash so that one acts immediately. Dispassionate reflection is simply not the suitable response here, but concentrated rage, which heightens one's awareness and sharpens one's powers, one's ability to think synthetically and analytically , enabling the mother to grasp immediately that a serious injustice is being committed against her daughter. The previous example involving M shows, on my reading of it, that (loving) calm reflection is not always sufficient for correct moral response, (if one assumes that M does in fact express a loving attitude toward D and her change of perspective is motivated by altruism instead of self- interest) . This example, by contrast, demonstrates that calm reflection is not always necessary for moral goodness and is in some cases inimical to this goodness. In presenting reflective love as the only kind of ethical emotion, the accounts of Murdoch and Nussbaum continue to present the moral saint, free of @nastyt emotions like hatred and rage, as the mode1 moral individual. While their moral

- - .-

78 Ibid., 91. 46 agent has accepted her capacity for 'evil', for rule-breaking, as part of moral responsibility, and not simply that it is al1 right to break some obligations they assume that one should admire those who maximally display traditional moral traits. But, as 1 have been suggesting, that there is only one mode1 of moral perfection, which a moral saint exemplifies, is far from obvious, especially since Wolf concedes that the moral saint is not a healthy individual, is "too good for his own well-being .w~~

Unlike legislative morality, the accounts of Miller, Nussbaum and Murdoch recognize as morally relevant differences between human beings in terms of their individual needs and commitments. But in regarding moral behaviour as behaviour that conforms to noms of 'decency' , and flows from loving calm attention, they do not acknowledge the moral relevance of social differences between human beings, differences that make such conformity for some an acceptance of the inferior status that society has relegated to them. Thus in regarding only certain forms of behaviour as moral, their accounts acknowledge only the suffering, the feelings, the dignity of the privileged, whose lives remain relatively conflict-free by

Wolf, v*Moralsaints, " 421. 47 everyonees adhering to noms of edecencyl. For Miller, in moral self-assessment, in detennining what sort of person one should try to be, one need only consider traits like kindness, generosity and flexibility. One need not consult a trait like political sensitivity, as expressed in behaviour that challenges oppressive structures. As a result, one can, 'without moral defecte, continue to engage in behaviour that is well-intentioned and humane but nonetheless discriminatory, such as that of M in Murdoch's example. Miller's account does not provide any way to adàress the immorality of insidious, subtle expressions of sexism, racism, classism or other deep-seated prejudices. For instance, consider the case of the white professor that bell hooks had during her graduate student days who, when she confronted him about racism, suggested in his negative attitude toward her, told her that he didnet even notice she was bla~k.~'Suppose he claims that he ignores hooks when she speaks because he so much enjoys hearing from the other students in his class. On Miller's account, it could be argued that his failure to give equal attention to hooks is wrong but that this does not imply he would be wrong not to change his great commitment to other students. After all, he could Say, his neglect of hooks has nothing to do with race; he simply doesnet notice her as much because, the argument

'O bell hooks, WgWk: maFewt.. . Th- B1PÎk (Toronto, Ontario: Between the Lines, 1988) 57. 48 could go, her comments in class are not as striking and intelligent as those of the other students. Of course, he should try to be more encouraging toward her but, given his commitment to academia and academic progress-a perfectly good commitment in itself-he feels his encouragement is better directed toward students whom he believes have a genuine potential of becoming professors. In this way the professor can avoid the distressing task of having to examine his behaviour closely and thus confront his possible racism (that he perceives her comments as lacking in intelligence because he thinks black people are not intelligent or because he uses racist standards of intelligence, as in the case where hooksl preference of certain unrecognized black authors over canonical white authors is seen as a sign of a poor intellect). But as a result he cannot obtain certain goods, like intellectual transformation and political consciousness, which contribute a substantial depth to one's life and are important ingredients of human fulfillment. In excluding a demand for radical self-assessment, moral accounts like those of Miller, Murdoch and Nussbaum endorse a narrow kind of happiness, though not necessarily tpush-pint or Ipig-like, but certainly of limited depth where some goods are never reached: wisdom, intellectual transformation, political consciousness. Intellectual transformation and political awareness often go hand in hand and begin with the 49 challenging of deeply held beliefs, a challenging that may cause much distress. In suffering a loss of faith, an individual experiences things as frighteningly uncertain. For instance, when someone first encounters feminist thinking, she is liable to become distressed: "Such unfair treatment of women is certainly exaggerated. When my father told my mother that her place was with the kids and made her stay home surely he wasnît behaving badly toward her. He is a kind and decent rnanogî Then, if she takes feminist thinking seriously, she will become angry: Wo many injustices against women!" Marilyn Frye describes a particular way of being in the world which she calls wwhiteliness,îî8'which captures and illuminates the kind of mind-set or mode of life that these moral accounts endorse, Frye argues that whiteliness is analoguous to masculinity, Whereas being male and being white-skinned involve having specific physical traits, being masculine and being whitely involve engaging in certain forms of behaviour. Just as one need not be male to be masculine, one need not be white-skimed to be whitely. Frye argues that whiteliness is connected to institutional racism in the sense that those who are whitely '@are well-suited to the social roles of agents of institutional raci~m.~~~She explains that just as masculinity is different from, though related to,

8 1 Marilyn Frye, Willful (Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1992) 147-169. Ibid., 50 sexism, so is whiteliness distinct from, but connected to, racism." Masculinity does not translate into hatred or hostility toward women; one can be masculine while being perfectly pleasant and well-intentioned toward women. Similarly, whiteliness does not necessarily involve anirnosity toward members of minority races. Whiteliness involves "a staggering faith in [one's own] rightness and goodness, and that of other whitely peoplen8' and belief that "one preserves one's goodness by being principled, by acting according to rules instead of feeling.n85 Whitely people, Frye claims, tend to be self-righteous. They strongly believe that their strict adherence to principles ensures that their behaviour is perfectly without favoritism or discrimination. A professional version of this kind of person believes that merit is a completely objective quality and that she hires a particular applicant because that person possesses the most merit, without any consideration of other aspects of the applicant that are not directly relevant to the position, e.g. gender, race, and personality traits. Frye argues that because whitely people have a sense of infallibility they are apt to be condescending and patronizing, on the one hand, and weak and insecure, on the other, since this sense of

Ibid. , 152. 84 Ibid., 154.

Ibid. , infallibility will inevitably be challenged by others. mile Frye concedes that the phenomenon she describes would seem like a character of middle-class people, she stresses that it is not confined to the middle-class, claiming that many working-class white people believe that they are superior to people they regard as non-white. 8 6 Whiteliness may seem to be peculiar to people of the middle-class because it suits them especially well, their authoritative positions of managing, disciplining, legislating and administering in a capitalist bureaucracy. 87 Essentially , whitely people, in embodying white supremacist values, support and enforce through their actions the very structure of racist domination that they claim to oppose in their adherence to 'impartialistn principles. Frye states that whiteliness involves seeing moral correctness as nnproprietyor good manners and abiding by the [white-supremacist] rules. Note the similarity to Miller's position, which maintains that the moral agent cannot be capricious and must foremost regulate her behaviour in terms of priciples and not act according to feeling: "Stable conformity to the right niles is sufficient for literal moral responsibility . As argued earlier, there is nothing in

86 Ibid., 158.

87 Ibid., 158.

88 Frye, Willful V-, 155. 8 9 Miller, -1 Differences, 371. Miller's account to adàress the possibility that these mles might be deeply prejudiced since he assumes that his criteria for moral responsibility contain ntruths,ll or are purely impartial. 90 Hooks validates the kind of phenomenon Frye discusses in her claim, expressed earlier, that when she confronted professors about their white-supremacist control, her cornplaints were met with a denial of culpability, betraying a sense of infallibility, where she was told that they didnlt even notice she was black. 91 Further, she relays how a non- white faculty member told her that in his English department there were only two black students and both of them had serious mental health problems. He said that at departmental meetings white faculty suggested black students simply did not have "the wherewithal to succeed in this graduate pr~grarn.~'~~ Believing the department to be well run and based on principles of fairness where every gsaduate student was treated equally, white faculty could not imagine that black students would be particularly at risk for developing emotional difficulties while working in a discipline that is scarcely willing to accept study and appreciation of works of non-white people.

9 0 Ibid., 368.

91 Hooks, wuRack: muFust.. . Thinb;ing Black, 57,

92 Ibid., 60. 53

Similarly, it may be argued that there must be something deeply prejudicial about the Western traditional institution of morality that makes it very difficult for members of oppressed groups to perform well, ta engage in morally correct behaviour. There must be something about this moral text, that it is only suited to some people who will find it agreeable and perform morally good works, whereas others will not find it so agreable and perform morally bad works, engaging in immoral acts.

In the chapters that follow, 1 will challenge traditional conceptions of moral correctness and wrongness, opting out of the old institution of morality and constructing a new one.

Chapter 2 shows how ideals of legislative ethics, such as the reduction of suffering, can get deflected in actual life through the development of traits that are presented as essential to the realization of these ideals. Chapter 3 establishes that challenging traditional understandings of good and evil is in keeping with a political agenda of promoting the interests of members of oppressed groups. By embracing 'evil1, or rebelling against moral institutions that exclude them, members of oppressed groups can, in certain instances, achieve human growth. This chapter sets the stage for the important role 'evill is to play in my moral perspective. Chapter 4 investigates different concepts of evil, demonstrating how they infonn different kinds of ethical theory and different understandings of moral agency. It prepares the way fox my own brand of feminist ethics which relies on some of these concepts of evil and rejects others.

Chapter 5 presents the moral perspective that 1 favour, drawing particularly on Machiavellils thought and Sarah Hoaglandls radical feminist ethics. It explains the moral signif icance of levil1 in my account. Chapter 6 expands on the feminist Machiavellian perspective presented in the previous chapter, exploring several Inasty1 emotions and their moral value in specific circumstances. The Conclusion defends the radical character of a feminist ~achiavellian moral approach, which identifies oppressive sexual, class, and racial structures as primary evils which the moral agent should combat. In Noddings claims that her work examines evil and then recommends Itturning away from evil with a fim 'This I will not do1 and ... living patiently with the evil in ourselves and others.~'~ My work also confronts evil and discovers that one can refuse to dampen anotherts happiness with malice or freeze out their pain with cold-heartedness. But it argues that decency is ineffectual when surrounded by mean or ignorant others. In these cases one turns to evil for

9 3 Ne1 Noddings, Homen md Evil (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 32. 55 assistance with its fiery energy and sharp and blunt tools. This thesis claims that in order to avoid committing wrongs one should accept the potentialities for both 'goodl and levil' in oneself and others, using 'evill when necessary for obtaining certain goods for human growth and fulfillment. CHAPTER 2: MORAL GOODNESS, NIETZSCHE, AND JANE EYRE

This chapter develops the claim advanced in Chapter 1 that traditional accounts of morality that present moral behaviour as behaviour that conforms to rules or, in Miller's case, to noms of 'decency, ' and arises from (loving) calm reflection, only give weight to the suffering of the privileged, who benefit from a universal adherence to these

'impartialist' principles. This claim may still seem very curious, particularly in the case of utilitarianism, which emphasizes an unbiased alleviation of universal suffering and could be used to justify the killing of innocent people treated as scapegoats for the greater good. It is not insignificant, however, that, for instance, a person scapegoated as a pepetrator of a heinous crime to stave off pub1 ic hysteria would most likely be relatively powerless , such as a poor, black man, who would fit racist stereotypes of the violent criminal. As stated in the last chapter, traditional moral theories do not acknowledge as morally relevant social differences between people and maintain that everyone should abide by the same basic rules, whether this involves acting in a way that causes more pleasure or pain, as in the case of utilitarianism, or respecting the interests of others by striving to be sensitive, generous and flexible in one's dealings with them, as in the case of Miller's account. 57 These theories do not take into consideration that people will benefit or suffer from the universal following of 'impartialist' rules depending on their social locations.

While moral value is assigned to lindecent, l or harm- producing, acts that are necessary for moral goods, such as criminal punishment, these harms are justified on the basis of altruistic concern for others, for their safety and protection, as expressions of sensitivity and concern for their interests; they are not justified as expressions of hostility and aggression for the sake of moral goods. It is a hallmark of traditional Western moral accounts to see an unneighbourly disregard of anotherms interests as wholly without moral value.

1 present and defend Nietzsche% position that traditional ethical theories, in regarding only certain forms of behaviour as morally good, actually contribute to the proliferation of human suffering and to a stunted mode of human living. In discussing his critique of Christian morality, in particular, 1 will show that there are some important parallels between the Christian moral agent (or one who is committed to Christian morality as understood and experienced by Western culture) and the kinds of self-denying individuals that kantian and utilitarian theories endorse. Wolf claims, referring to the Christian notion of hell, the kantian moral saint, who sees goods other than moral ones but will not allow himself them, has "a pathological fear of 58 damnation, perhaps, or an extreme form of self-hatred that interferes with his ability to enjoy the enjoyable in life. These words also apply to the utilitarian moral saint who likewise severely restricts himself in terms of the number of non-moral goods he pursues, eschewing the pleasures of, for instance, leisure activities or sexual relations.

Nietzsche argues that a morality that is ultimately defined in terms of standards of decency, and conceives as morally superior those who embody traditional moral traits, embraces a tranquillizing happiness, a happiness of resting and not being disturbed, of attained satiety. He writes: "Al1 these moralities that address themselves to the individual, for the sake of his lhappiness,l as one says-what are they but.. .recipes against his passions, his good and bad inclinations insofar as they have the will to power and want to play rna~ter."~' On Nietzschels view, moralities like utilitarianism and other traditional accounts of goodness are what he calls "slave-moralities .@lg6 They glorify qualities

94 Wolf, "Moral Saints," 424.

95 Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good-ad mil, Basic , ed. and trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: The Modern Library, 1968) part 5, section 198, 299.

96 Nietzsche, Bevom Good ring Ev il, l, associated with the oppressed, such as self-abnegation, benevolence, kindness, humility, modesty, and patience. Aggressiveness, independence, creativity, a certain kind of arrogance that rejects social subordination--traits that oppressed perçons need to overcome obstacles and attain their fulfillment-are not promoted. 97 Explaining the different treatment these opposing sets of traits receive, he characterizes slave-morality as a morality of utility. Certain traits are considered good because they are useful or practical. 98 Warm-heartedness, patience, charity, humility, modesty, friendliness, obedience are considered good, Nietzsche argues, because they are useful in preserving the homogeneity and peace of the community. Whatever endangers the community, or undermines its established order, has no practical function in this respect. The 'good' person is one who keeps himself inconspicuous and unremarkable in every respect other than in his 'goodnesst; he is one who "does not outrage, who harms nobody, who does not attack, who does not requite, who leaves revenge to God, who keeps himself hidden

. . . who avoids evil and desires little from life. 'lg9 From a Nietzschean perspective, Christian morality not only makes

97 Nietzsche, Fevond Good and Evil, part 5, section 201, 304.

9 8 Nietzsche, Geneal_o.gv of MO-, Basic Writinas0. Qf Niet-, first essay, section 3, 463. 99 Nietzsche, Geneolocnr of m,first essay, section 14, 482. 60 slaves of those constitutionally and othewise unsuited to meet its demands; but of everyone it enjoins a stunted existence. (Traditional) virtues, Nietzsche claims, are merely vices grown tired and la~y;'~*goodness is synonymous with weaJcness: an unwillingess to seek revenge is denied, suppressed, destroyed ability to seek revenge. It should be emphasized, however, that Nietzsche is not reversing the traditional moral hierarchy , and placing (traditional) vices on top. In criticizing traditional morality for focusing only on the 'goodt tendencies of life and enjoining the individual to develop these alone, he is not arguing for the individual to do the opposite and seize upon only 'evil' potentialities. He is not claiming, for instance, that one ought to seek revenge, that revenge is desirable in some categorical sense for maximizing impersonal goods like the general welfare. He is only claiming that an absolute unwillingness to exact revenge flows from a squinted view of life, a general denial of life in its fullness, its multidiversity, its unevenness. Challenging Christian morality for embracing an absolute unwillingness to express levil' traits, Nietzsche discusses how this morality exhorts us not to rob or kill, asking: ''1s

100 Friederich Nietzsche, Thuç S~okeZar~+.Us+r_a, 2hg Portable Nietxsck, ed. and trans. Walter Kaufmann (Hanaondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1984 ) , second part, section 5, 206. 61 there not in al1 life itself robbing and killing?l'lO1 Such rules, he argues, created to guard against immorality, are by their own standards inmioral, robbing life of its richness, killing 'evilm tendencies as soon as these show themselves. On his view, the tendencies to hm, to attack, to destroy are as much inherent in life as 'good' tendencies to forgive, to withdraw, to absorb insults and hurts: "Life itself is essentially appropriation, injury, overpowering of what is alien and weaker; suppression, hardness, imposition of one's forms, incorporation and at least, at its mildest, exploitation. Considering Christianity as an example of a traditional account of moral goodness helps to show more clearly certain inadequacies of traditional accounts of moral goodness in general. The kind of happiness that traditional moralities embrace is best illustrated in Christianityms emphasis on an afterlife and promise of heaven as a resting place, as a reward and consolation for the suffexing meek and mild. Nietzsche argues that this tranquillizing happiness is a by- product of Christianityts endorsement of pity, which he presents as an egoistic, destructive emotion, without moral

'O1 Ibid. , third part, section 11, 3 14.

'O2 Nietzsche, mdGood and EyiL, section 200, 321, emphasis mine. 62 va lue. 'O3 Traditional moralities are moralities of pity. While pity is often defended as a moral emotion, pro-pity positions typically rest on a confusion between pity and compassion, For instance, Nussbaum has written some articles on pity that defend pity as equivalent to compassion. 104 Nussbaum% position is useful to explore and challenge here to show that Nietzsche, in criticizing traditional moralities for endorsing pity, is not attacking compassion. To reject pity as having moral value is certainly not to deny the moral worth of compassion; in fact, it is to deflect attention away from pity ont0 compassion with the aim of emphasizing its moral value.

Nussbaum equates pity not only with compassion but also seemingly with self-pity. She claims that in the Qdvssev the king Antinoos, in refusing to provide for Odysseus disguised as a beggar, "refuses to see in the beggarts curent state

103 Nietzsche, Bevond Gogd md Eu, section 225, 343, IlThus Spoke Zarathustrafw second part, section 3, 200-202.

'O4 Martha Nussbaum, "Pity and Mercy: Nietzschefs Stoici~rn,~Nietzçche. Ge~a-tv : P-avs 'ç Gvoforals, ed. Richard Schacht (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) 139-167; Martha Nussbaum, wCompassion: The Basic Social Emotion, PO~~W,vol. 13, no. 1, Winter 1996, 27- 58. 63 possibilities for his own life, for human life in general. But seeing certain possibilities for his own life is not synonymous with seeing certain possibilities for human life in general. The former expresses a concern with self, and would seem to involve self-pity, whereas the latter expresses a concern with humanity, with self and others, and would seem to involve compassion. And it is the concern with self, with self-pity, that Nussbaum identifies as a pre-condition for pity. She mites: l'One will not respond with the pain of pity, when looking at the suffering of another, unless one judges that the possibilities displayed there are also possibilities for oneself ."'O6 On her view, if one thinks one is immune to the fate of the beggar then one will not feel beneficent when face to face with a beggar. Referring to

Rousseau's (Book IV), she quotes: wwWhyare the rich so harsh to the poor? It is because they do not have fear of becoming poor. But if pity has its basis wholly in self- interest, it is surprising that Nussbaum, who essentially embraces traditional moral values, would perceive it as a legitimate moral emotion. For Nussbaum, one feels pity at the sight of a beggar not because the latter's lot is intrinsically evil , is a repugnant embodiment of social

105 Ibid., 141. 106 Ibid., 142. 107 Ibid., 144. injustice, but because this lot could conceivably become one's

Own. While pity is connected with selfginterest, this connection is more distant than Nussbaum assumes. The pitier pities not because she is uncertain whether she will remain privileged but because she sees the pitied as enough dissimilar to herself that she can rest assured that she will not in the future share the other's state. Xf Antinoos had given the beggar a meal, there would be no reason to assume that this was because of a belief that he might come to share his miserable existence. Harshness and pity toward the oppressed have the same underlying motivation: Why are the rich so pitying of the poor? It is because they have no Eear of becoming poor. Any pain the pitier experiences toward a beggar is similar in kind to the repulsion one might experience toward someone showing the unsightly signs of leprosy. One ' s repulsion either takes the form of aggression and harshness, with the desire that the person be removed, or beneficence and pity, where any act of pity serves to alleviate the original repulsion and to reassure oneself that one can guard against such loffenses'.1 O8 In this sense, pity abstracts from the individual features of the person, her various traits, needs

108 ~rederick Nietzsche, -e&, trans. R. J. Hollindale (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982) Book II, section 133, 84. 65 and interests. It does not see the person at all, and in this blindness, strips her of her individuality. Pity does not help the pitied achieve well-being or happiness but degrades her, keeping her in a state where pity is needed. While Nussbaum claims that the term "pity," from the Victorian period onward, has acquired overtones of condescension and superiority toward the suf ferer, 'Og she seems to assume that equating pity with compassion will somehow purify pity. But that a fundamental attitude of superiority in pity remains is evident in her assumption that the very category of the oppressed is inevitable: "[In her pity] she will be inclined to want a society in which the lot of the worst off--of the poor, of people defeated in war, of women, of senrants--is as good as it can bewl'O; "Without being tragic spectators, we will not have the insight required if we are to make life somewhat less tragic for those who, like Philoctetes, are hungry , and oppressed, and in pain. ""'

As Sarah Hoagland argues, the difference between empathy, or compassion, and pity is that whereas in the former one sees another as a "living, active being who makes choicesl@and can provide reasons for those choices, in the latter one sees

------109 Nussbaum, Vompassion: The Basic Social Emotion," 29.

"O Ibid., 36.

111 Ibid., 58. another as a passive victim "to whom something happened.~"~ In pity one lowers one's expectations of another, seeing her, condescendingly, as not capable of attaining the same goods as oneself, whether these be sufficient food, shelter, love, wealth, or happiness .113 Nussbaum dismisses point blank Nietzsche's arguments against the moral claim of pity, and emphatically states that the pro-pity tradition provides arguments that show conclusively that the experience of pity leads to deeds of beneficence. This, however, is not at issue in the pro-/mi- pity debate, but whether such deeds genuinely and substantially benefit those receiving them. Nussbaum states that in pity one treats the other as one would wish oneself to be treated in similar circumstances. 114 For instance, a woman has lost al1 of her money and material goods through no fault of her own and is reduced to begging on a street corner. Others stop and &op coins into her hand. It would seem that, on Nussbaum's account, this gesture is one of pity. But it is unlikely that small coins are what the deprived woman really wants and should want. Rather, one would think, she should want something that would actually help her regain self-

112 Sarah Hoagland, Lesb- -CS: Toww- (Palo Alto, Calif ornia: Institute of Lesbian Studies, 1988) 151. 113 Ibid.

114 Nussbaum, "Pity and Mercy, 157. 67 suffiency, for instance, that the large sum of money that others are spending on superfluous goods be given instead to social programs that would create more job opportunities or ensure that she find work. In contrast to the pitier, the Nietzschean woman will not look down on the one suffering with a lpoor yod expression, assuming an attitude of superiority, thus reinforcing the other's isolation and misery. Rather, she will concern herself with helping the other maintain or achieve self-command. Nussbaun claims that in rejecting pity, Nietzsche has no basis for a commitment to material beneficence or the equal distribution of social goods. 115 But the ideal of self-command is not necessarily inharmonious with this commitment. The Nietzschean rich woman will give the poor person the means to grow her own crops. Thus the burden of argument is rather on Nussbaum to show that and how pro- pity agents will be committed to equality. Traditional moralities, then, as moralities of pity , would seem to have an equivocal position on suffering, on the one hand perceiving it as bad and unjust, on the other, seeing it as tolerable, as sornething that does not need ta be remedied: as long as the oppressed are pitied, are the recipients of acts of charity, there is no strong motivation to transform their lot or the society of which oppression is seen as an inherent, inescapable feature. To quote Blake:

115 Ibid., 148. 68 "~itywould be no more/If we did not make someone POO~.@*"~

In the final section 1 will uncover several implications of traditional moral accounts for real moral life, through an application of Nietzschean insights to Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane. In so doing 1 will demonstrate Nietzschefs claim that in limiting the morally good to @nice1 forms of behaviour, behaviour that realizes good v human potentialities, traditional moral theories undermine the full acknowledgment of human suffering and thus their own altruistic pro jects: in kantian accounts, the pro ject of treating others as having intrinsic value; in utilitarian accounts, the project of maximizing happiness,

In Jane Evre the protagonist Jane develops a close friendship with saintly Helen Mills in her youth during her stay at Lowood, a charity school for orphaned girls notorious for its devotion to religious asceticism. Helen is continually berated without due cause by Miss Scatcherd, the history and grammar teacher, but remains calm and passive throughout. When Jane challenges her nonresistant attitude, she answers:

116 William Blake, "The Human Abstract, It WhRowtiq Poetuand Prose, ed. Russell Noyes (New York: Oxford University Press, 1956) 206, lines 1-2. 69 It is far better to endure patiently a smart which nobody feels but yourself, than to commit a hasty action whose evil consequences will extend to al1 connected to you- and besides, the Bible bids us return good for evil. "' Helenls view of goodness incorporates both utilitarian and kantian considerations. It is utilitarian in evaluating an act as morally good that reçults in more happiness than suffering, in one %martW that she alone feels rather than "evil conseq~ences~~that affect many . It is kantian in regarding an act as morally good if it expresses a categorical imperative, such as the holy command to "return good for evil." A bit later she claims that since her goodness toward Miss Temples is the product of inclination instead of effort Vhere is no merit in such goodne~s.~"~Only the act done from duty has true moral worth. While kantianism and utilitarianism represent two distinct ethical viewpoints, their peaceful coexistence within Helents vision of goodness is not astonishing, and simply points to some of the problems which they share concerning suffering and the superficial treatment that they give it. These problems pertain to the legislative approachts neglect of the quality or mode of life which different actions express (e.g., noble or base, admirable or contemptible), as seen in Chapter 1 in the

117 Charlotte Brontë, Jane (London: Macdonald & Co., 1975) 56.

118 Ibid., 58. 70

discussion on Taylor. ~ccordingto utilitarianism an act that produces more suffering than happiness cannot be morally good even if it safeguards or promotes one's persona1 integrity. Similarly, for kantianism an act that violates a categorical duty cannot be morally good even if it is in keeping with one's fundamental values and projects. Helen ' s "doctrine of endurance, so ponderously expressed in her utilitarian appeal to consequences, is one by which Jane cannot abide: If people were always kind and obedient to those who are cruel and unjust, the wicked people would have it al1

their own way: they would never feel afraid, and so they would never alter, but would grow worse and worse. When we are struck without reason, we should strike back again very hard ... so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again. 120 At f irst glance, it would seem here that Jane, like Helen, is simply referring to consequences in maintaining that to be good to those who are bad has the negative effect that "those who are cruel and unjust . .. would never alter. But she is doing more than that. She is expressing a concern with the kind of individual to which various forms of goods and harms contribute, and she is doubting that the kind of person who is

119 Ibid., 56.

120 Ibid., 58. good to those who are wicked is actually rnorally praiseworthy. Being good to those who are bad leaves unchallenged their wickedness so that they are not able to becorne morally better people. Jane rej ects the Christian model of neighbour-love, according to which one should do no harm to others but only good . Instead, she patterns her dealings with others, intimates and acquaintances alike, after the ancient Greek mode1 of friendship . Nietzsche writes: IlIf you have a suffering friend, be a resting place for his suffering, but a hard bed as it were, a field cot: thus will you profit him best. And if a friend does you evil, then Say: '1 forgive you what you did to me; but that you have done it to yourself-- how could 1 forgive that?lr'Z' For instance, instead of sympathizing with and giving comfort to a suffering friend by supporting al1 her negative perceptions and pronouncements as she wallows in her hurts, one should help her by emphasizing and encouraging her independence, so that she takes active steps toward her recovery. According to the Greek model, which Nietzsche exnbraces, friends are concerned about and aid in each other's pursuit of self-perfection so that when one acts in a way that hinders one's self-perfection as in committing a wrong against the other, this damage to self is in one sense more offensive to the other, committed to her own

121 Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," second part, section 3, 202, emphasis in original. and the other's self-perfection alike, than the wrong in itself: l'Al1 great love ... still wants to create the beloved. 'Myself 1 sacrifice to my love, and my neiqhbour as myselft-- thus runs the speech of al1 creators. dz2The friend loves the other with a commitment to the creation of higher human forms, of human beings who govern themselves instead of being governed by others: "In your friend you shall love the overman as your cause. In the ancient Greek tradition, friendship embodies ideals that al1 human relations should be governed by, whether or not they are based on strong affection. The kind of individual celebrated is, to quote Aristotle, concerned with the pleasures and pains that arise in social intercourse. To any of these which it is not honourable or expedient for him to encourage, he will object, and prefer to cause pain. Also if his acquiescence in another's action would bring disgrace, and that in high degree, or injury, on that other, while his opposition brings little pain, he will not acquiesce but will de~1ine.l~~

These words convey the same kind of sentiment as those of Jane

'22 Ibid. , emphasis in original. 123 Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra, f irst part, section 14, 168.

124 Aristotle, Nit- Ethj CS, trans. S. A. K. Thomson (Middlesex, England: Penguin Books Ltd., 1982) 1126b11-30, 163. 73 quoted earlier, but the kind of character recommended is not simply one who returns evil for evil and good for good. This individual responds with good or evil, as the situation demands . Later on at her auntls death bed, Jane turns to the healing powers of forgiveness and forgives her aunt for having tormented her, behaving as one who has claws but chooses not to use them. But she never loses sight of the object that inspires these earlier words and which makes her vision of life so strikingly different from that of Helen. This object, warm-blooded, suffering humanity, is lost to Helenls eyes, which are fixed on God and Heaven, where men and women can escape the %xmbrous frame of fleshgland the sin lodged within it.'26 The creed that Helen follows enables her to forgive the criminal, as merely one among many "burdened with faults, 11"' whi le abhoring his crime;'" thus she claims : Vevenge never worries my heart, degradation never too deeply disgusts me, injustice never crushes me too low: 1 live in calm, looking to the end. 11129 Injustice and the suf fering it occasions,

12' Nietzsche writes: Werily, 1 have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no clawsN (Thuç Snoke Zarazuçtk,3, second part, section 13, 230) . 126 Brontë, Jan& Evre, 60 .

127 Ibid., 59. Ibid. , 129 Ibid., 60. impressing deeply upon Janegs heart, pass by Helen scarcely noticed, as less real to her than the l1mighty homeu of pure spirit^."^ On Helen' s view, Miss Scatcherd is not cruel but acutely aware of the faults of others and harsh in her treatment of these. What Jane perceives as an injustice is for Helen an unfortunate clash of personalities: 1 am, as ~issScatcherd said, slatternly; 1 seldom put, and never keep, things in order; 1 am careless; 1 f orget

rules; 1 read when 1 should learn my lessons; 1 have no method; and sometimes 1 Say, like you, I cannot bear to be subjected to systematic arrangements. This is al1 very provoking to Miss Scatcherd, who is naturally neat, punctual, and particular. 131 When Jane adds to this portrayal of Miss Scatcherd that the latter is lvcross and cruel" Helen will not accept this addition and remains silent. 132 The point being expressed here is not that Helen is weak. While virtue to her is, in Nietzsche's words, Vhat which makes modest and tame,tt133it would be wrong to see Helenms disposition to please and gratify as a sign of weakness. To see her in such a way would oversimplify her situation and

130 Ibid. 131 Ibid., emphasis in original.

132 Ibid. 133 Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra, third part, section 5, 282. 75 blame her for factors over which she has no control. She is an orphan, a child and poor, at the mercy of adults on whom

she depends for her livelihood. In view of this inescapable dependency, one could argue, it would not be wise for her to protest against her tormentor's ill-treatment of her. To do so would surely incur punishment, perhaps in the form of food deprivation, isolation and even banishment from the place that keeps her. Helen recognizes this. After Jane boasts that if Miss Scatcherd struck her with a rod she would hit her back, Helen replies that then Jane would be expelled from scho01.'~~ Thus rather than see Helents quiet resignation as a sign of weakness, it might be more appropriate to see it as a sign of strength, as an expression of courage and fortitude, as a

survival method she has fortuitously developed enabling her to live as long as she does. This reading supports my earlier claim that traditional accounts of moral gooàness work against the oppressed. Helen must be humble and obedient in order to maintain a form of existence that befits only a slave. However, if the il1 treatment Helen received occurred under different circumstances, if her social position were not one completely devoid of power, if, for instance, Miss Scatcherd had less control over her destiny and was simply a teacher about whom she could complain to kind and concerned parents at the end of the day, then resignation would seem

134 Ibid., 58. more truly a manifestation of cowardice. There would be no reason for Helen not to resist Miss Scatcherd, except a thorough cornmitment to a morality of self-denial,

Bracketing, then, the value of HelenBs traits for her own survival in an oppressive society, one can see clearly their value for preserving the order of that society and minimizing disturbances. Nietzsche writes: High and independent spirituality, the will to stand alone, even a powerful reason are experienced as dangers; everything that elevates an individual above the herd and intimidates the neighbor is henceforth called evil; and the fair, modest , submissive conforming mentality , the mediocrity of desires attains moral designations and

honors. w135 Al1 those traits signalling a superiority of any kind, whatever delight they afford, upset the neighbourls sense of persona1 equality among differences, and thus in this respect are perceived as bad. From this perspective, it may be said that Janels remarkable endurance arouses ber auntgs mistrust and hatred, just as Helen s intellectual superiority annoys and angers Miss Scatcherd. Nietzsche claims that "love of the neighbourw is "always something secondary, partly conventional and arbitrary-illusory in relation to fear of the neighb~ur.~'~~On a Nietzschean account, Miss Scatcherdls abuse

135 Nietzsche, Be~ondGood and-, section 202, 303- 304, emphasis in original. 77 of Helen is essentially punishment for her strengths and stems from resentment. Miss Scatcherd's lack of warm regard toward Helen shows the true impotence of neighbour-love within a Christian framework, a framework that accepts only 'good' human tendencies and conceives 'evilt ones as perverse, as manifestations of a tainted human nature. A traditional view of goodness is based on a form of self-hatred which an oppressive society requires of al1 its members, the disadvantaged and advantaged alike. Miss Scatcherd's hatred for Helen is simply projected hatred for herself, for her own potential for 'evill. As Nietzsche writes: IlHe (the slave moralist] has conceived 'the evil enemye 'the Evil One,' and this in fact is his basic concept, from which he then evolves, an afterthought and pendant, a 'good ~ne~--hirnself!~~'~' It should be emphasized that Nietzsche does not repudiate love of the neighbour as such but only strips it down to its roots and shows what it essentially amounts to in the context of Christian morality's ethos of self-abnegation. When he writes that Vhere can be no morality of Ineighbour love'wvas long as what is dangerous to the community% sense of equality is considered immoral, he means that Christian "neighbour-

'36 Nietzsche, Bfiu, section 201, 303.

137 Nietzsche, Weolocrvof Moralç, first essay, section 10, 475. 138 Nietzsche, Beyond Good and mil, section 201, 302. love,lt founded on a certain kind of self-hatred, is a fleeing from oneself, regardless of whether it takes a pleasant cast (as in charity) or an unpleasant cast (as in punishment for 'one% goodw). In chastising Jane for her preoccupation with revenge, for thinking Voo much of the love of human beings, and not enough of f%m invisible world and a kingdom of spirit^^"'^^ Helen articulates this aspect of ~hristian morality. While Nietzsche claims that "a gruesome sight is a person single-mindedly obsessed by a wrongIBwas such obsessing is self-consuming, he maintains that a little revenge is better than no revenge at all. 140 A little revenge would enable the wronged to expunge the offense so as not to let it fester and cause draining resentment. Welen recognizes that it is self-destructive to obsess about an injustice against oneself, claiming: %ife appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs.1w14' But she fails to see that it is also self- destructive simply to turn the other cheek, an act which basically amounts to denial, seen clearly in Helen1s unwillingness to acknowledge that Miss Scatcherd has committed any wrong against her. It is like receiving a wound from a knife and denying that there is anything that needs attending

13' Brontë, meEYag, 101.

"O Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra, f irst part, section 19, 180.

141 Brontë, meBvre, 90. 79 to, simply letting oneself bleed. While, as noted earlier, it is admittedly imprudent for Helen to protest strongly against Miss Scatcherd's abuse of her, this abuse is clearly causing her much heartache, and to raise her drooping spirits she should at the very least assert its true nature to herself and Jane and join with Jane in ranting about it. In refusing to see Miss Scatcherd in a negative light,

Helen can only perceive herself as severely lacking, and one wonders if she had been more like Jane, more defiant instead of resigned and depressed, she might have been better able to combat the illness that eventually defeats her in her early youth at Lowood. From a Nietzschean perspective, Helenls purist understanding of goodness as precluding harm to self and others, where one completely sides with the 'goodl human tendencies, grounds a stunted, shallow existence, as seen with Maggie in Nussbaumls account of Henry James' The Golden Bowl. This keeps her dom, her eyes Vixed on the fl~or,'~"' and promotes her destruction. What Helen views as goodness, passive acceptance of abuse, is not only harmful toward herself but also harmful toward others. Though Helen expresses a concern for others, for instance in her reference to "evil consequences@' that will befall others from an action that returns evil for evil, 143

142 Ibid., 52,

143 Ibid., 56, 80 this concern remains suspended at an abstract level, beyond the reach of even those whom she loves most. After describing in detail the ill-treatment she received from her aunt, Jane asks Helen: "1s not Mrs. Reed a hard-hearted, bad woman, 1114' to which Helen responds, Vhe has been unkind to you, no doubt; because you see, she dislikes your cast of character, as Miss Scatcherd does mine.11145These are hardly words that serve to soften the tremendous blows Jane has suffered and would seem insensitive, just like the remark IIThough his action was brutal, he struck you because he didn't like your lack of compliance. II It is a serious criticism of traditional morality that a thorough investigation of an example of its lived application should reveal how its altruistic ideals, such as the alleviation of suffering, can get deflected in actual life through the development of traits, e. g., humility, charity, forgiveness, self-denial, that are presented as essential for the realization of these ideals. As Helen strives to meet the extreme demands of legislative morality, she is not the kind of individual Miller's person-centered account would Say one should, or has to, become in order to qualify as a morally responsible agent. But, as evidenced by a certain measure of insensitivity or cold detachment, nor would Helen seem

144 Ibid., 59. 145 Ibid. 81 admirable, to embody some moral perfection that one should strive to approximate. The mode1 of human excellence that Helen embraces seems constraining when compared with that which Jane endorses in refusing to be 'good' ," to %ot outrage, . . . [leave] revenge to God."lP6 ~his apparent inadequacy significantly challenges the belief that moral goodness is a matter of realizing 'good' human potentialities, and thus presents the problem of determining what moral goodness is.

146 Nietzsche, Geneabqv of Mou, first essay, section 13, 482. CHAPTER 3 : MORAL LUCK, MORAL DEVIANCE AND REASONABLENESS

In the last chapter I showed, through the discussion of the character Helen in Jane, that traditional moral virtues like self-abnegation and humility in the oppressed tend to maintain servile forms of living and do not promote human flourishing. While Helen is able to express these 'virtuest, she is not able to display a trait like generosity because of her low economic status. In this sense, one can question whether a trait like humility is universally a moral virtue or only in those who do not need it as a practical virtue for survival, who are very fortunate, or are relatively high in a social hierarchy. For instance, some might Say that royalty have good reason not to be humble and so are particularly praiseworthy if they are humble. Consider Princess Diana of Wales, now dead, who is widely regarded as saintly, it would seem, partially because she was not snobbish and genuinely affectionate toward kommon folkf. Further, the Princess is also revered for her generosity, a traditional moral virtue which, however, someone as wealthy as the Princess could very easily achieve. Claudia Card aptly articulates the complex relationship between moral attainment and social factors.147 She takes issue with the kantian assumptions that everyone has the same

opportunities to become morally good, faces the same level of difficulty in attaining this end, and can obtain the same basic character development. 148 On her view, the extent to which one will be virtuous depends on one's social situatedness, on one's privileges and liabilities informed by gender, race, class and sema1 orientation. For instance, it will be impossible for a person suffering severe economic oppression to exhibit the virtue of liberality. 14 9

Correlatively, this person, continually made aware of people with wealth, will have much difficulty escaping the vice of envy. F'urther, women, who are socialized to place high value on their physical appearance, will have to struggle to resist acquiring the vice of vanity.

Given that oppression makes certain virtues difficult or impossible to develop, Card asks whether those who are oppressed should be considered moral agents at all. 150 Under oppressive conditions, when the choice is between two evils, ordinary moral expectations lose their force. On Card's view,

147 Claudia Card, TJ-al Lotte-: aacter Moral Luck (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996) 4. 148 Ibid.

14 9 Ibid. 150 Ibid. people who engage for self-defense in behaviour that is immoral under normal circumstances , such as deception, are justified from the point of view of j~stice.'~' Similarly, Sissela Bok claims, "In extreme and prolonged threats to survival , as in plagues, invasions, religious or political persecution, human choice is intolerably restricted. 152 In life-threatening situations it is morally acceptable to lie. However, Bok limits acceptable lying to life-threatening situations and maintains an 'err on the side of caution1 policy of truth-telling beyond this area, stressing the danger of expanding deceptive practices. 153 She assumes that the area of life-threatening crisis is clear-cut and considers no cases involving oppressed persons that are less conspicuously ones of prolonged threats to survival but actually are more commonplace than the examples she presents. Women will have particular difficulty achieving the virtue of truthfulness since, as Adrienne Rich argues, for women in a society where men have power over them and they occupy mainly subordinate positions, lying has become a necessary, much used survival tool. 154 For instance, Rich

Ibid. ,

15' Sissela Bok, w: Choice in Pmic and ivate. Life (New York: Vintage Books, 1989) 111.

154 Adrienne Rich, tlWomen and Honor: Some Notes + on Lying, Wl>menvm 85 refers to the lie of the Irhappy marriagern where a woman pretends every day that she is satisfied with her marriage, never complaining to others and always seeming cheerful .155 The woman may lie for fear that her husband will leave her and she will be left alone and destitute, if she has few marketable skills for achieving financial security, having devoted al1 her time and energy to domestic affairs. Or she may be afraid that if she tells her husband that she does not want to live a servile existence, her husband will become angry and beat her, a not so unlikely occurrence given the widespread phenornenon of wife abuse. Consider the well-known case of Franche Hughes, who incinerated her husband, after years of abuse and unsuccessful interventions of the law, while he was asleep. On the fateful night she had returned to her Dansville, Michigan home from business college and put a frozen dinner in the oven for her husband, James. 156 James became angry, and told her that she should be at home preparing him meals instead of going to college.'" He beat her up, ripped up her schoolbooks and assignments and made her

oghy, ed. Marilyn Pearsall (Belmont, california: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1993) 393.

15s Ibid., 392. 156 Ann Jones, Nomen Who (New York: Fawcett Crest, 1988) 299. 157 Ibid. 86 burn them in a trash barrel. 158 For a woman in a severeïy constricted situation like that of Hughes, who has good reason to think that telling the truth will bring her great harm, lying is a meaningful and reasonable choice. However, although Card maintains that lying, cunning, deceit and manipulation can be justified if they are needed for self-preservation, she emphasizes, "they are surely not virtue~.~'~~She mites, ltThosewho tell just the right lies to the right people on the right occasions may have a useful and needed skill. But it does not promote human good. Human good may be unrealizable under such conditions. On her view, human good involves relationships of equality and trust, and these cannot be achieved by people who must engage in deceptive practices for survival. 161

1 agree that lying undermines the trust needed for friendship in the sense that those who make a practice of lying to people who have power over them will have difficulty disowning this tool in relationships with people who do not have such power. But this does not mean that lying cannot sometimes, in certain instances, promote human good and thus be morally good. In fact, in Cardl s discussion of "burning 87 bed casestV1cases that derive their name from the case of Franche Hughes, she maintains that killing (which is usually considered worse than lying) may sometimes be the product of moral growth. On her view, killing as a way to end an otherwise inescapable relationship may be the result of ethical growth, of being able to act under richer ideals; a woman ends a bad relationship because she believes she deserves better ones. 16' She maintains that those who are forced to choose among bad options can only act at best under what Ne1 Noddings calls "diminished ethical ideals. d63 Card states: Killing as a way out may thus seem at once excessive from the point of view of what the assailant deserves (in some cases, although not in others) but also required from the point of view of the victim and what circumstances make necessary to preserve her life. Logically both could be right. In such a case the best the victim may be able to

do is to act under a diminished ethical ideal. 164 It would seem that, according to Card, if in killing her assailant the woman causes worse harm to him than he deserves then she chooses the least unjust action and acts under a diminished ethical ideal. If, however, death is indeed

162 Ibid., 88, my emphasis.

163 Ibid., 86.

164 Ibid., 88. 88 exactly what her assailant deserves then in killing him she does him no wrong. In this situation in killing him she does not act under a diminished ethical ideal, It is not entirely clear what cases, on Gard's view, would constitute ones where the assailant deserves death. Perhaps these would be ones where there is no doubt that ber assailant will kill her if she does not kill him first or where his behaviour toward her has been absolutely horrifie. While the conclusions that Card draws from these two different situations are plausible and compelling, to say that the best that the woman can do if her assailant does not deserve death is to act under a diminished ethical ideal leaves out an important, positive discovery that can be achieved in both situations, This is the discovery of a new kind of moral value. If killing the assailant is necessary for the womanBs escape, and the law or help from others has proven insuff icient, then whether or not the assailant actually deserves death, whether , for instance, crimes of the sort he has committed should be punished with death in a court of law, is morally irrelevant. The increased richness of the womanls ideals enables her to recognize not only that she does not deserve bad relationships that jeopardize her life but that whatever act is necessary to preserve her life is morally right. Thus in neither situation does the woman in killing her assailant necessarily act under a diminished ethical ideal. card states that the notion of acting under a diminished ideal notably makes use of what Bernard Williams calls a

"moral remainder. "16' By this he means that even after one has acted the best way possible under the circumstances there may be "ethical cause for regret.w166 One sometimes cannot avoid wronging others, subjecting them to harm that they do not deserve. But, as I have just argued, in cases such as burning bed cases, the issue of whether the woman acts under a diminished ideal can be sidestepped by pointing to the potential of the discovery of a new moral value. If the woman cornes to recognize that whatever a&, however extreme, that is required to preserve her life is morally right, then if this act be killing her assailant there need be no regrets. And the woman who does not feel regret should not be judged a moral monster. Admittedly, it would be ideal if the woman rallied up supporters and launched a grand scale protest for greater legal protection against assailants, forcing judicial representatives to enact better laws. But as Miller acknowledges, being a morally responsible individual does not require being a moral hero, and any insistence that she must go to such great lengths of persona1 sacrifice to escape committing 'evil' is demanding too much. 167

.. . -......

16' Ibid., 87. 163 Ibid. 167 Observation due to Rosemary Renton. 90 One might concede that such situations do provide opportunities for the discovery of new sorts of moral insights but argue that since it would be better if such situations did not arise at all, whatever moral insights that are achieved can be at best compensatory: in an ideal society there would be no need for such compensatory moral insights. However, for one, it is not clear that in the best of al1 possible worlds, plentiful in human goods such as friendship, love, equality, and justice, deceptive or destructive action would never be needed to achieve such goods. This question is closely connected to the fxequently debated question of whether in the best of al1 possible worlds there would be pain. Assuming that in this ideal world human beingç would still be finite and mortal, vulnerable to illness and disease, then just as pain would continue to serve as an indicator of these conditions, so also might deceptive behaviour still function as a tool for self-preservation. What if someone in this ideal world accidentally ate some poisonous , immediately addictive mushrooms and hallucinated that your hand was a mushroom which she was aggressively trying to eat. You make up the lie that you know a place where she can find a large pile of mushrooms, in actuality luring her to a place where you will both be safe. If you were not familiar with the practice of lying, and did not conceive it as a possible form of behaviour, you could end up in severe pain and with a mangled hand . Further, as is often argued, vices like 91 jealousy can breed healthy cornpetition and the achievement of human excellence in, for example, the realms of music and sports. For instance, cornpetitive figure skater Shanti wants to become an Olympic figure skater. But another skater, Frieda, who has been performing better than she, is threatening her chances of becoming part of the national team. If she does not feel any jealousy toward Frieda she will essentially not believe that she has as much right as Frieda to be a member of the team, because jealousy by definition involves a belief that one is just as deserving of a coveted object as another. While Cardas account emphasizes social differences between human beings, and the opportunities or lack thereof these differences imply for the achievement of moral goodness, in regarding virtue as that which can best be attained in ideal conditions, it does not challenge the traditional derivation of moral values from a utopian vision of society. On Card's view, people who are oppressed suffer from "moral darnage."l6' Card mites: "The claim that a people has been oppressed implies that its members have been damaged-perhaps not all, not always irreversibly, and usually not thoroughly . However , the claim that oppression causes moral damage would seem ta imply an initial moral wholeness that can

268 Claudia Card, "Womenas Voices and Ethical Ideals: Must We Mean What We Say,It n,99 (October 1988), 130.

'69 Ibid. 92 be cracked or shattered, that only the fortunate can preserve: for instance, in women who do not suffer from other forms of oppression like racial or class oppression and who have led relatively unstressful lives. Oddly, Card refers to the privileged as morally damaged as well, in their being Viable to arrogance with its blindness to othersl perspective^.^'^^ This notion of moral damage relies on an ideal of human wholeness that is based on a derivation of moral values from a utopian vision of society. Card seems to assume that only in an ideal society, where oppressive structures are non- existent, can people achieve their full moral potential. This lingering classical influence in Cardls account would seem to be a function of her assumption that persona1 moral goods are necessarily determined by impersonal ones-that the point of view of justice, with its values of impartiality and fairness, reigns supreme. As was seen earlier, for Card, a woman% decision to end an abusive relationship by killing her partner may reflect ethical growth but if in so doing she subjects him to worse harm than he deserves, this ethical growth is lcancelled-outl. Since she acts under certain ideals that are diminished, namely, the justice ideals of fairness, her 'evil1 act can only be demoralizing and occasion regret.

170 Card, The U- Lottery, 53. 93

Through an examination and critique of aspects of Susan

171 Babbitt Is book =ssme Drem 1 will show that persona1 moral goods are not necessarily determined by impersonal ones like eqyality and justice by demonstrating that certain forms of behaviour traditionally regarded as immoral can have moral value and promote human good precisely because they are morally deviant and can challenge deeply prejudiced moral institutions. Babbitt gives the example of Seth in Toni Morrisonls novel Beloved who kills her daughter and tries to kill her other children when she sees her ex-slave master coming toward her to take her back with her children to 'meet Home', where she lived as a slave. In terms of an impartialist view of agency, it might seem inappropriate to debate about whether this action was moral or immoral since, as a slave by virtue of her black skin, Seth lacks moral status and is not a member of the moral community. As Babbitt argues, Seth decides to kill her children not so much "to go against morality" as "to claim its possibility," to raise herself up from her subordinate status and affirm her personhood .17' As a slave without rights, Seth has no recognized claim to her children, to love and safeguard their interests. In the context of a social system that makes their lives living deaths, her decision to kill them springs not

171 Susan Babbitt, ~oss~eDreu (Boulder: Westview Press, 1996). 94 from perverted feeling but from intense love and a refusa1 to accept the kind of existence this system has allotted to them and to herself.

Now consider another example that Babbitt presents of Dick Gregory in Niaaer who impulsely thows a brick at a store's window in revenge or protest against the storekeeperws racist treatment of him. 173 Though Gregory is not seen as something to be bought and sold, and his personhood receives forma1 or legal recognition, because racism nonetheless persists in the society in which he lives, his membership in the moral community means little: he still is treated as an inferior on the basis of his race and so he has almost no power to effect change-his opinion, his vote, as it were, is not taken into account. Thus it may be argued that in his law-breaking act he decides not so much to be 'badu as to daim meaningful inclusion in the moral community, to forcefully express his opinion that the social system is unfair. His action is not different in kind from that of Seth but only in degree, where he is trying to have his personhood fully recognized while Seth is fighting to have her personhood and that of her children simply seen in the first place. Further, although Gregory's criminal act may be seen not as really a protest against morality but as a violent declaration of his right to be treated with basic respect, 95 this declaration is admittedly retaliative. Babbitt claims that the example of Gregory is one in which a strong persona1 commitment, in this case a commitment to oneself, provides reason to go against general moral principles. Indeed, if the young Dick had not been committed to morality and if he had not possessed a strong sense of self-respect, the act would not have been particularly interesting. The choice is interesting because we know Gregory is sincere about morality, that he cares enormously about how he is perceived by others and about how he is able to perceive

himself .174 Babbitt claims that this act is "not obviously unreasonable, even though wrong. 1f175 Babbitt uses the example of Gregory to illuminate some problems with Miller's account, showing that it would be difficult to argue, in terms of his account, that Gregory's act is reasonable. On Miller's view, it is sometimes not unreasonable to do wrong according to traditional moral standards if one does wrong because of strong persona1 commitments and one's wrongdoing does not exceed certain boundaries of human decency. In chapter 1 1 discussed Miller ' s claim that everyone must subscribe to a particular

174 Ibid., 159.

17 5 Ibid., 175. 96 catalog of noms in order to qualify as morally responsible, requiring capacities like noncapriciousness or regulation in terms of principles and a certain degree of traditional moral traits like compassion, benevolence and generosity. For instance, on Miller's account, it is not unreasonable for Phi1 to neglect to check his answering machine because of his strong commitment to his family. For Miller, neglecting to check his answering machine results in inconveniences for others; it does not cause them gross harm. Thus for Miller, a problem with seeing Gregory's act as reasonable is that his act is not minimally respectful of the shopkeeper and is capricious. Though ~abbittargues plausibly that it could be seen as noncapricious "with a role in a process of development, of what Miller calls ' self -regulation, d76 it is not itself an instance of self-regulation since Gregory's life would not seem trouble-free enough to have what is necessary for self-regulation, namely, a certain degree of self- integration, where his desires are in keeping with his activities, where he can implement his values. Given his commitment to moral values, his basic respect of others, Gregory does not value a life of crime but his act certainly has the potential of being an instance of this and as he lacks social advantages and opportunities, his life options are limited.

17 6 Ibid., 160. 97 As Babbit argues, another difficulty with showing in te= of Miller's account that Gregory's act is reasonable is that there is no well-established moral community to which Gregory can appeal in order to attest to the reasonableness of his act? Even similarly insightful, similarly situated people, black people subject to both racism and poverty, might f ind his act crazy if they have internalized the noms and values of the dominant group. '" On iller ' s view , l'normal, morally insightful, morally serious'' people care about avoiding harm to others and being seen as avoiding such harm. 17 9 He maintains that one could not "live with oneselfw if one knew that one was not as good as other people thought, so that even a crime that has no witnesses, like that of Gregory, would not be rea~onable."~But as Babbitt argues, for some people conforming to what is considered reasonable is actually incommensurable with a cornmitment to self .la' Seth in Morrisonls Belaved would have been rejecting her basic humanity if she had given away her children to slavery, thus denying her right to claim them as hexs to love. Babbitt argues that Gregory's act, though reasonable, is

177 Ibid,, 160. 178 Ibid.

17 9 Miller, mal Differenceç, 316. 180 Ibid.

"' Babbitt, ~mpossulenreqmg, 161. 98 wrong because it is not "morally appropriate in general to throw bricks through windows even if one is ~~~ressed.'~"~She irrites: 'The fact that pursuing self-respect sometimes involves immoral acts implies not endorsement of immoral acts but criticism of the society in which the pursuit of self- respect has sometimes to be of that sort."18' Like Card, she derives ethical values from a vision of an ideal society, attributing no independent moral value to Gregory's act. On her view, moral goods are based on abstract, impersonal considerations, such as generalizability. Gregory's act of throwing the brick is an instance of wrongdoing on her account, since it departs from general moral principles, but one that is pardonable, or morally reasonable, because it aff irms his commitment to self-respect. The main point of departure between Miller and Babbitt is that they disagree about what criteria need to be satisfied for someone to be a morally responsible person, and thus to be engaging in morally reasonable, or morally permissible, behaviour.

Babbitt maintains that denying that the action is morally reasonable "begs the question of what defines the standards of reasonableness according to which his action is to be described, interpreted, and discussed to begin with. But

182 Ibid., 175.

183 Ibid., 175,

184 Ibid., 175. 99 then it would also seem that denying that his choice can be morally correct begs the question of what defines the standards of moral correctness according to which his action is to be judged. Miller maintains that it is always reasonable not to do what is morally wrong. But if the morally correct is not always based on at least some abstract and impersonal considerations, on "the truths in the legislative approach to morality , then it would seem unreasonable and wrong not to throw the brick if throwing it contributes to both Gregory% moral development and that of the orner. If Gregory doesn't throw the brick, if he doesnlt protest against his oppression in assertive acts of retaliation, will he not stagnate, or even plummet, personally/morally? If his self-esteem sinks lower and lower, if he becomes thoroughly filled with self-hatred, it will be very diff icult for him to conduct himself morally, in a way that benefits himself and others. Essentially, Gregory will not even be able to be someone who consistently follows noms of decency-what Miller conceives as a morally responsible person. Further, if the ownergs racism is not addressed, if he continues to act in a way that mistreats others on the basis of race, how can he progress morally, and show respect toward al1 human beings regardless of race? Babbittls account has the merit of recognizing that what

185 Miller, mal Djfferenceç, 367. 100 can be seen as reasonable, or non-crazy, does not always require that minimal conditions of decency, of respect and

sensitivity, be satisfied. But 1 would like to push it a step further (a step which may seem more like a leap) by challenging traditional moral standards and their role in making his act appear unreasonable, or foolhardy, or simply deviant, full stop. While, as Babbitt claims, storytelling that calls into question dominant noms and values, like Gregory ' s autobiography Niaaer, serves to make actions like that of Gregory appear reasonable, it also helps to make such actions appear moral, as contributing to a good life. As a reader of without a deeply entrenched commitment to traditional morality or with an equally inflexible commitment to conventional criteria of rationality, Gregory's choice to throw the brick strikes me as not unreasonable because it appears to me as morally good, as promoting human fulfilment. Given Gregory's own commitment to his moral development, it may be said that in his law-breaking act he is challenging morality's basic constituents--the assumption that morality is about conforming to abstract and impersonal requirements. Suppose that throwing the brick did in fact make Gregory and the store owner more admirable people, though perhaps none the happier--Gregory gaining a firmer sense of self-worth in exacting a little revenge on the storekeeper, the storekeeper realizing that he had not acted so well toward Dick, that his actions had been not so much generous as paternalistic and 101 steeped in racism--would not this cal1 into question the traditional composition of moral gooàness, and make it seem made up of 'goodl and 'evil traits, harm as well as the avoidance of harm? As an appendage to this discussion on morality and reasonableness I refer, rather grimly, to an actual case discussed in the newspaper me Toronto that is reminiscent of and continuous with the fictional account of Toni Morrison's character Seth. In this case a mother smothered her three-year-old daughter to death because her estranged husband was going to get custody of her and she believed that he was sexually assaulting the child. After killing her child she tried to kill herself by jumping off the eighth-floor balcony of her appartment but was stopped by a law enforcement officer. Staff reporter Wendy Darroch mites: When police asked 'Did you kill her?' Babineau replied, 'No,

1 saved herl./Babineau was under the delusion that her estranged husband Larry Babineau was sexually assaulting the child .. .. Three psychiatrists agreed that when she killed her daughter she was 'fdepressed, anxious, disorganized and delusional. The judge ruled that while the defendent had committed first degree murder, because she was suffering from a major mental disorder, she was not criminally responsible.

Darroch states: Wr. Justice David Watt of the Ontario Court,

186 Wendy Darroch, %iller Mom Ruled not Responsible ,f1 me TwoStar [Toronto] 4 November 1997: B3. 102 general division, said the 45-year-old woman lacked the capacity to know that her actions were morally wr~ng.~'~' One of the presiding psychiatrists said in court: %ven to this day she remains a diagnostic mystery. But there is something definitely wrong." A more crucial question, however, is left unanswered: Was the womanls estranged husband sexually assaulting the child? Evident ly , the three

psychiatrists involved and the judge regarded as delusional Babineauts belief that he was. But it is unclear whether they investigated this belief to any extent, whether, for instance, the childls body was ever examined for signs of assault. If Babineau had some basis for believing that her estranged husband was sexually assaulting the child then her various emotional distresses--seen as symptoms of some mysterious mental disorder--and the judgets belief that she lacked the capacity to know what was morally wrong should be seen in an entirely different light. If one assumes that her estranged husband was a serious danger to the child, then the killing of her child could be seen as, in the words of Babineau, "saving herIWglike Seth's daughter, from a fate possibly worse than death (depending on specific circumstances, e.g., the likelihood of the father seeking help or being denied parental rights). Thus, if she had no other ways of protecting her child, as in the case of Seth, the

.. .. 187 My emphasis. 103 womanls act could be seen as not necessarily unreasonable or morally wrong. ~lternatively, one could come to the conclusion, in evaluating her act, that though the act was reasonable given the circrmistances, it was morally wong. One might argue that she should have killed the wrongdoer-her estranged husband-instead as that would certainly have put an end to her husbandls sexual abuse of her daughter. However, in either case, one is assuming that it is sometimes morally good to do what.would ordinarily seem not only morally wrong, but morally outrageous--to engage in a destructive act of violence that results in anotherk death. Here one sees traditional moral valuation thrown on its head, upturning al1 of one's conventional moral beliefs. If one assumes that Babineauls husband was guilty of her allegations, it could be argued that it was abi in eau's bad moral luck, possibly an abusive upbringing with the result of very low self-esteem, that led her to marry the kind of man who would prove to have a fatal influence on the course of their child's life. It was also her bad moral luck that the justice system repeatedly fails to protect children from serious han, even when there is strong evidence to indicate that a particular person poses a great danqer to a child. And it was her bad moral luck to be a member of an oppressed group and have her allegations against her husband hastily pathologized, her claim to moral agency outright rejected. Essentially, it was her bad moral luck to come to do something 104 that would make her seem 1ike Seth, in the eyes of al1 conscientious legislators of moral laws, a moral monster. Unlike law enforcement officers who are rewarded (with badges of honour, promotions, etc. ) for defending people and their rights, there are no Kantian 'shining jewelsl for those who defend fiercely their children to the extent that they will kill them to protect them against harms worse than death. Ironically, an institution of morality that prides itself on its fairness, on its universal accessibility, reveals itself to be at bottom highly unjust. CHAPTER 4: EVIL AND MORAL AGENCY

In Eaijriff Evil John Kekes argues that vices embody independent human potentialities that compete with the potentialities expressed in virtues. Human welfare is promoted not by developing human potentialities indiscriminately but only good human potentialities, such as the propensities for kindness, altruism, compassion and generosity. 188 Evil propensities like greed, selfishness, aggression, malevolence, and envy should be suppressed. 189 Kekes compares morality to language, maintaining that acquiring moral agency is like aquiring one's native languagelgO: Both are skills, both are possessed by just about everybody, both are acquired as a matter of course (and it is not their possession but rather their lack that requires explanation), both allow for ranking agents according to their performance, both are necessary for the welfare of individuals as well of society, both require conformity to rules, both can tolerate some

"' John Kekes , Faciga Evj 1 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990) 117. 189 Ibid.

190 Ibid. , 118. 106 violations of the rules, and the rules of both can be

changed either deliberately or by gradua1 evolution. 191 According to this view, being immoral involves being a poor moral perf ormer. A person in whom the vices have achieved inner dominance has failed to properly develop moral potentialities. But immorality, Kekes emphasizes, is not simply moral def iciency . While one form of immorality involves a failure to realize good human potentialities, another involves an active pursuit of countervailing evil potentialities: wImmorality is not just a form of omission, due to ignorance or weakness, but also an active force of evi1. "lg2 For this reason Kekes claims that health is a better analogy to morality than language. The evil person, in whom the vices rule, is as if in the grips of a disease, which causes moral corruption and deterioration. Most people, however, who tend to be neither perfectly healthy nor fatally ill, are relatively morally healthy, rarely reaching the peaks of moral sainthood or plummeting deep into moral monstrosity, occasionally dipping into immorality as if for a swim after a long day of good moral works when one's conscience has become tired and lax. Kekes' view of the basic parameters of moral life is a standard one which has persisted throughout the Western

19' Ibid. , 119. 192 Ibid., 119. 107 history of moral philosophy to the present day despite an ever-growing clamouring of feminist challenges to traditional female virtues which promote subservient roles for women, such as that of self-abnegation. In this chapter 1 will draw on the analogy of morality to language which Kekes discusses as I explore traditional and feminist moral accounts, highlighting some of the features which he identifies. What are seen as essential for the well-being of iridividuals and society and as violations of interna1 nom of moral systems depends largely on what are identified as primary evils. It will be shown that different concepts of evil inform different kinds of ethical theory and understandings of moral agency, These concepts are: (1) evil as the absence of knowledge and as weakness (Plato, Weil, Murdoch, Charles

Taylor) ; (2) evil as the material and bodily realm (Judeo-

Christian tradition, Plato, impartialist ethics) ; (3) evil as female (Western philosophical tradition, Judeo-Christian tradition); (4) evil as disobedience (Judeo-Christian tradition and impartialist ethics); (5) evil as pain and separation (care ethics-Noddings); (6) evil as violence and victimization (radical feminism--Mullett, Bartky); and (7) evil as maleness and as patriarchy (radical feminism-Frye, Hoagland) . Of ten philosophers distinguish between natural, cultural, and moral forms of evil, 1 do not find such distinctions useful or relevant here as my argument is that different ethical theories identify different phenornena as 108 evil in relation to the moral agent whose role it is to combat them. Thus though it could be said that strictly speaking victimization is a moral evil whereas pain is a natural evil and patriarchy is a cultural evil, their greater or lesser significance in morality depends on how they are envisaged from the moral agent's perspective.

1. Evil as the Absence of Knowledge and as Weakness

In the ReDublic Plato uses the allegory of the cave to depict evil as a deprived, fallen state, identifying primary evil as the absence of kn~wledge."~ The cave, consisting of little light and mere shadows, represents ignorance. Those who inhabit the cave are confused and blind to the essence of things, the Forms. For Plato, knowledge of the Forms is innate; education does not put knowledge into the soul, as

I1putting sight into blind eyes, 111g4 but rather turns the soul in the right direction and to the right objects. Ascending from the cave, and shifting attention away from the material and bodily realm, involves a moral pilgrimage, in which one

193 Plato, Uato's Rem, trans. G. M. A. Grube (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1974) book vii, 167-191.

lg4 Ibid., 171, 518c. must overcome many intellectual hurdles and achieve mastery over such abstract subj ects as mathematics , geometry , stereometry, astronomy and harmonies. 195 As Kekes claims, the view of morality as a ski11 can be traced as far back as plato. lg6 After much exertion the Form of the Good is apprehended and one achieves moral knowledge: when seen it must be reckoned to be for al1 the cause of al1 that is right and beautiful, to have produced in the visible world both light and the form of light, while in the intelligible world it is itself that which produces and controls intelligence, and he who iç to act intelligently in public or in private must see it.lg7 Embracing Plato s concept of evil, Simone Weil mites, "One does not fa11 into good. The word baseness expresses this property of evil. "lg8 Being 'goodt requires great will-power and the overcoming of one1s l naturall, ' fallen state: "The unreality which takes the goodness from the good, this is what constitutes evil. mil is always the destruction of tangible things in which there is real presence of good. Evil is carried out by those who have no knowledge of this real presence ."Ig9 In robbing Greek towns of their revered statues,

195 Ibid, 173-191, 521d-541b. 196 Kekes, -a Evil, 119.

198 Sirnone Weil, The-, ed. George A. Panichas (New York: David McKay Company, Inc., 1977), 388. 110 the Romans caused the life of the Greeks to diminish in reality, because of the value the Greeks attached to the obj ects .200 The statues 'were presentf to the Greeks in a way they could never be to the Romans, who attached no spiritual significance to them. 201 The Romans had no knowledge of this real presence. 202 Echoing Plato, Weil writes: "In that sense it is true that no one is wicked voluntarily. "'O3 Further, those who choose to do evil, Weil maintains, do so out of weakness: "To allow the imagination to dwell on what is evil implies a certain cowardice; we hope to en joy, to know and to grow through what is unreal .*1204 Similarly, Iris Murdoch, also working within the ~latonic tradition, refers to "our fallent human condition, w205 identifying evil with sin, guilt and error and perceiving the task of morality to be "the purification and reorientationw of "the sou1 as a substantial and continually developing mechanism of attachment~.~~~~~Through morality, "the fat

199 Ibid., 387.

'O0 Ibid.

201 Ibid., 387.

202 Ibid. 203 Ibid.

204 Ibid., 388.

'O5 Murdoch, çovereicrntv of the Goo~,28. 206 Ibid., 71. relentless egow can be overcome and human perfection approximated. 'O7 Moral tasks are endless; the moral pilgrim must continually strive to overcome states of illusion where one sees othexs in the dim, derogatory light of selfishness, blind to their goodness because of fear, prejudice, or rationalization: Wirtue is the attempt to pierce the veil of selfish consciousness and join the world as it really is. tt208 This attempt can never be completely successful because we are always engaged in the world as individualç and so can never entirely overcome consciousness of our own persona1 values and commitments. 20 9 Charles Taylor elaborates on the notion of moral pilgrimage in presenting the self as forever re-orienting itself in "moral space:" It is only slowly that we grow through infancy and childhood to be autonomous agents who have something like

our own place relative to the good at all. And even then, that place is constantly challenged by the new events of our lives, as well as constantly under

potential revision, as we experience more and mature. 210

207 Ibid., 52. 208 Ibid., 93.

'O9 Ibid., 93.

Charles Taylor, Çources of the Self: the M-CI gf e Mo- I&ntiw (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1989) , 47. An orientation to the good is inescapable, and we are continually re-articulating this go&--re-defining our values- -in our quests for greater perfection. Sometimes one discovers that a new direction in which one projected one's life turns out not to reflect growth but regression. Taylor mites: "We have to move forward and back to make a real assessment. w2" For example, one might discover that a new relationship one has formed is no different from previous destructive ones, and is characterized by manipulation and abuse. One retraces one's steps and hopes to understand how one was misled, what weaknessess, what def enses, of the old self reasserted themselves, such as fear or rationalization: did one rationalize a hint of malice in the other? Conversely, one might find that in searching for richer joys in life and trying out new avenues of meaning, these afford leaps of progress. A woman might join a feminist group and decide that her ultimate allegiance is to women, rather than to her husband whom she has been senring slavishly for years. After subduing her fears, she joins a lesbian separatist community.

2. Evil as the Material and Bodily Realm

Several feminist philosophers argue that the tradition of Western philosophy is built on a dualistic view of human life

211 Ibid., 48. that values the mental over the physical, the 'godiyl over the

' mere mortal .212 In the works of Descartes and Locke, for instance, experience is presented as a deceptive, untrustworthy reaïm. Further, many moral philosophers may be said to denigrate human experience in presenting moral behaviour as a matter of following abstract, impersonal principles, such as the categorical imperative and the utilitarian calculus, while giving little or no moral weight to the particularities of individual situations. Of ten the examples that are presented in writings that adopt a traditional approach toward moral issues involve scenarios that are unlikely to occur in actual life, such as the following one and variations of it: if one was shipwrecked and could either Save a stranger or one's wife whom should one choose to ~ave?~'~ The devaluation of human experience can be traced to the writings of Plato. But while Plato maintains that the obtainment of the Good requires ascending from the cave, overcoming the material and bodily realm and pursuing the

212 See, for example, Genevieve Lloyd, f (Minneapolis: University of .Minnesota . Press, 1984) and Susan Bordo, The Fljqht to Ohiectivltv:- Essays- on Cartesianiçm 4ng Culture (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987). 213 Virginia Held makes a similar point in Femlnist. . . . - itics (~hicago: The University of ~hicago Press, 1993) 34. She argues that traditional moral theory frequently concentrates on hypothetical experience, on the point of view of a hypothetical ideal observer. 114 mental, he does not see the material and bodily realm as unequivocally evil. The good person for Plato does not conquer the appetites and live the life of the ascetic. He does not simply tend to the rational part of the sou1 and neglect the appetitive part, hoping that it dwindles out and dies. Using reason, he recognises and satisfies the needs of the appetites in moderation. Consistent with these views, Plato maintains that those who have completely emerged from the cave and obtained knowledge of the Good-those "supreme moral playersw--must descend again and take turns ruling the city. Thus on Platofs account, the active moral agent turns away from levil1--the realm of experience and the appetitesœ- so that he may turn to it again with his eyes wide open, with full knowledge and understanding. But that the appetites remain essentially submissive, Plato is clear. When the appetites rule, reason can only obey: Van it benefit anyone,

1 said, to acquire gold unjustly if when he takes the gold he enslaves the best part of himself to the most vicious part?w214

3. Evil as Female

In arguing that Western philosophy has tended to prioritize the mind over the body, feminist philsophers

2 14 Plato, -, 236, 589d. maintain that the mind-body dualism is gendered. The mind is seen as masculine whereas the body is seen as feminine in a polarized, hierarchical relationship. 215 Throughout the Western history of philosophy one can find ample evidence to support this claim. Probably the most striking, if not rather horrif ic, example is Sartre's p&a and Notwess. As Margery L. Collins and Christine Pierce argue, Sartre depicts Being-in-itself (thingness) as female and For-itself as male

(freedom) by àrawing on gender and sexual stereotypes.'16 The For-itself is seen as aggressive, conscious and independent whereas the In-itself is viewed as soft, docile, and clinging:

The For-itself is suddenly compromised. 1 open my hands,

1 want to let go of the slimy and it sticks to me, it draws me, it sucks at me. . . . It is a soft, yielding action, a moist and feminine sucking ... 1 cannot slide on this slime, al1 its suction cups hold me ba~k.~l' The devaluation of the feminine, in general, is inf onned by the myth of the Fa11 of Man. ~ccordingto this myth, Eve succumbs to the serpent's charmç and entices Adam to eat the forbidden fruit. Judeo-Christian versions of the myth paint

215 Susan Bordo, me Fligbt to Obiectivitv. . and Genevieve Lloyd, The. Lloyd ' s work provides excellent documentation of the history of gendered reason. 2 16 Margery L, Collins and ~hristinePierce, l'Holes and Slime : Sexism in Sartre ' s ~sychoanalysis, Ehilosou Fom 5 (Fall/Winter 1973) 113-4.

217 Jean-Paul Sartre, Beina andotmess, trans. Hazel Barnes (New York: Washington Square, 1972) 776-7. 116 Eve as especially culpable in introducing evil into an originally good world. According to Noddings this myth has had enormous influence on the development and proliferation of patriarchal cultural practices. She quotes Mary Daly, who mites: "The myth has in fact affected doctrines and laws that concern womengs status in society and it has contributed to the mind-set of those who continue to grind out biased, male- centered ethical theories. w2'9

4. Evil as Disobedience

Noddings argues in Nomen and Evil that the Judeo- Christian tradition concentrates on evil as disobedience in its doctrine of original sin, which maintains that because of Adam's and hre's defiance of God, human nature is essentially fal~en.~" In order to atone for the original folly, human beings must act according to Godls will as embodied in holy decrees. The harm that human beings might inflict on each other and themselves in following these decrees is considered secondary to the primary evil of disobedience. 22 1 Consider, for instance, the physical punishment of children by parents.

218 Noddings, Pomen andmil, 51. 219 Mary Daly, BPg(Boston: Beacon Press, 1974) 52. 220 Noddings, Pomen and Evi 1, 90. 22 1 Ibid. 117 This activity is compatible with the cornmanàment of honouring father and mother, which reinforces parental authority. The suffering that children experience in such treatment is seen as 'for their own goodt, as teaching them not to disobey their elders. It is viewed as secondary to the prime evil of disobedience to the laws of the home, Further, the harm the parent incurs to himself in causing pain to his children is also regarded as secondary to this prime evil. As Noddings argues, ~hristian theology presents human harm as less significant than disobedience to God by according it pedagogical, therapeutic, or redemptive value. On her view,

assigning these values to harm as such is not problematic but doing so in relation to %odls will," patriarchal laws and principles that support the hierarchical social order.

In Chapter 2 1 drew a parallel between the Judeo- Christian tradition and legislative ethics in their neglect of the suffering of the oppressed. I argued that they both endorse the self-denying individual. Here 1 want to make a different kind of claim, namely, that just as Christian theology identifies disobedience to the patriarch as primary

evil, so also does legislative ethics focus on evil as disobedience to moral principles and laws. This can be seen by considering the Christian theological foundation of kantianism and the religious mainsprings of the principle of utility. The Christian theological heritage of kantianism in particular has been amply documented by Arthur Schopenhauer in

his work On the Basb of Morditv. Schopenhauer argues that kantianism takes from theological morality its imperative form, and thus the concepts of law, command and obligation and

the concept of a holy Kingdom from which these concepts derive their significance and force. While Kant continually asserts that there is no good incentive to morality apart from a pure rational interest, he often appeals to religion to enforce his claims, referring to the will as m~holy,~222and duty as a "sublime and mighty naiaewL2' that fills us with fear and makes

Iteven the boldest sinner tremble. w224 That he regards disobedience to the moral law as evil and not simply as a product of human weakness there is no doubt. In peliaim. . . he writes: %vil occurs when ... our self-love is allowed to take precedence over doing our duty .. . . What is evil is to deviate from the moral law in the name of self-l~ve.~~~~~For Kant, immorality is a form of omission that is an assertive expression of 'evilm potentialities-of selfishness. If Natasha lies ta her father

222 Immanuel Kant, Critlçlilw. . of Pracficpl Re- , trans . Lewis White Beck (Chicago: ~niversityof Chicago Press, 1949) 208.

224 Ibid., 172.

22 5 Immanuel Kant, Belluon. . Witm the L~ts. . of Reaçon BLQM, trans. Theodore M. Greene and Hoyt Ha Hudson (New York: Harper & Row, 1960) 32. 119 to Save herself from severe punishment, in her aselfishnessa, she actively does wrong. While utilitarianism does not have a theological foundation in the way that kantianism does, Mill invokes religion to explain and justify utilitarianism. He refers to the external sanctions of the principle of utility as "the hope of favour and the fear of displeasure from our fellow creatures or from the Ruler of the universe. 1'226 He maintains that with respect to the religious motive those who believe in the goodness of God and regard whatever promotes the general welfare as good cannot but hold that God approves of it also. 227 More relevantly, he compares the principle of utility to God, arguing that the ultimate sanction for both is always subjective feeling, be it a conscientious feeling for humanity (as in the first case) or religious feeling (as in the second). The principle of utility and God both represent intuitively obligatory appeal~.~*~Like the Categorical Imperative, the Principle of Utility commands obedience no less than Goda Obedience to the utilitarian principle ensures a pure will, free of corrupting, self-regarding influences. In utilitarianism, as in kantianism, morality involves an attempt

. . 226 Mill, Utuitarianisaf 41. 227 Ibid.

228 Ibid. , 44. to purge the selfishness-@the sin1--of the individual and attain a state of law-abiding guiltlessness. Mill refers to selfishness as "the principle cause which makes life ~nsatisfactory.~~~~Like Kant, Mill is particularly stem with respect to any violation of moral rules. In discussing the practice of t~th-telling,he claims that a lie contributes to weakening that practice so that he who, for the sake of a convenience to himself or to some other individual, does what depends on him to deprive mankind of the good, and inflict upon them the evil, involved in the greater or less reliance which they can place in each otherls word, acts the part of one of their worst enemies,2 36 (While Mill admits of some exceptions to the llsacredllrule of veracity, he limits these chiefly to cases of withholding information that could seriously harm s~meone.'~') As in kantianism, in utilitarianisrn it is morally wrong to violate moral laws. In so doing one succumbs to "self-indulgent squeamishne~s~'~~and acts according to levil' potentialities such as self ishness, cruelty, or greed. It is self ish for Karima to ignore the utilitarian calculus and refuse to

22 9 Ibid., 20.

2 30 Ibid., 33, emphasis mine. 231 Ibid.

2 32 Bernard Williams, "A Critique of Utilitarianism, 102. 12 1 sacrifice time with her friends and work overtime at the battered womenWs shelter; it is cruel for her to deny battered women more of her time and care. In giving the evil of disobedience to moral laws prime importance, kantianism and utilitarianism, like Christian theology, present the harm that human beings might cause to each other and to themselves in fulfilling moral obligations as negligible, as secondary evil, or as having some compensatory significance. On a kantian account, it is either

(1) morally wrong for Natasha to lie to her father about how her glasses got broken, even it is to escape an unduly harsh punishment; or (2) morally permissible for Natasha to lie, since it is to avoid unjust treatment: lying is not seen as having any independent positive moral value. Similarly , according to utilitarianism, that Karima and her friendships will suffer from hex working overtime at the battered women's shelter is seen as having very small moral weight compared to the amount and intensity of suffering she can help to lessen by working overtime. Many utiliarians would maintain that while it is morally permissible for Karima not to work overtime, and she is not being a moral monster for doing so, she is not approximating traditional moral ideals of altmism, generosity, etc. Most obviously, given that the perfect impartialist agent will have to sacrifice much, e. g. , close friendships, the suffering associated with these sacrifices can scarcely be said to carry any first-order moral weight. For instance, Ricardo has been supoenaed to testify in court that his friend was attacked and killed by a group of gay-bashers. Ricardo would like to do the right thing, but it is quite likely that he will be beaten up by friends of the gang or even killed. Since the conviction of the gang would prevent them, at least during their prison term, from assaulting or killing other gay men, and would challenge homophobia in general, according to utilitarianism, Ricardo ought to submit his testimony. Though this testimony could bring great harm to Ricardo, on a utilitarian account, he can be consoled by the knowledge that he did the right thing. His suffering will not be in vain, or without compensation, since the act which caused it enables him to partake in moral goodness and enjoy the dignity afforded to al1 moral agents. As Taylor would Say, the significance of ~icardo's suffering is defined in advance by the homogenous realm of the moral, in terms of its single kind of good. There is no consideration that Ricardo testifying against the gang presents a high danger to himself, so that insisting that he do so might be requiring not just moral courage but moral heroism. There is no acknowledgment of a cornmitment to self as having any significant moral weight, as figuring into a good kind of life. While person-centered accounts like that of Miller do not concentrate on evil as disobedience to moral principles and laws, such an association lingers in the assumption that moral 123 behavior involves conforming to noms of decency. As Miller claims, Phil, who neglects to check his answering machine, does wrong. "' In his account, moral behaviour actualizes ' good' human potentialities such as altruism, kindness, generosily. Miller's agent acts, if not always purely altruiçtically, at least in terms of standards of decency where some limited notion of altruism is presupposed. Nowhere in Miller's account is there any admission that morally correct action can be the expression of 'evill human potentialities. (In special cases like self-defense ferocity is seen as only morally justifiable, not morally good).

5. Evil as Pain and Separation

Whereas impartialist ethics assigns moral priority to the oaedience of impersonal laws and rules, care ethics gives supreme moral relevance to the harm that human beings cause to each other. Noddings, a chief exponent of care ethics, maintains that a preoccupation with rules and regulations deflects attention away from the primordial suffering of human beings. 2 34 Because women have traditionally been involved in

...... - - - - 233 Miller, #, 381. 234 Noddings, Wornen and Evil, 90. care-giving activities they cannot escape seeing this suffering. On her view, to induce, sustain, or fail to relieve pain, separation, or helplessness is immoral.235 Care ethics rests on the belief that, because of nature, nurture, or some combination of these, men and women adopt different moral viewpoints. While impartialist ethics is seen as male- centred, care ethics is viewed as female-centred. In care ethics, the kinds of relationships accorded moral value are not forma1 and impersonal, as in impartialist ethics, but rather, informa1 and personal. 236 Moral life is about responding to the concrete needs of others for whom one cares rather than about meeting the abstract demands of generalizable situations. Many feminist philosophers have criticized care ethics for championing female virtues that safeguard a patriarchal system.2 37 As Sheila Mullett argues, the moral ideal of caring prescribes that one become engrossed in the other, focusing completely on the other person's wants and inter est^.'^' While

235 Ibid., 229.

236 Claudia Card, "Gender and Moral Luck," 200. 2 37 See, for example, Allison Jaggar, Feminlçt. . Po- . and Human Nat- (Totowa, NJ: Roman and Allanheld, 1983) ; Rosemarie Tong, mt. . Thouqht: a Compremsive -odu (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1989; Joan Tronto, ItBeyond Gender Difference to a Theory of Care," w, vol. 12, no. 4, 1987, 644-63. 238 Sheila Mullett,. I1Shifting Perspective: A New Approach to Ethics, 1t mstPer-~ectj ves : Puos-j cal Fssavs on (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988) 125 Noddings emphasizes that in caring for others one maintains one's 'ethical self1, the kind of self she endorses is a self that defines her needs and interests largely in terms of those of others ,'3g As a result, her account is unable to conceive as morally valuable action that would seem necessary for the integrity of the self but that does not support the caring ideal. For instance, it ca~otregard as morally positive a woman's separation from an abuser. Noddings mites: l'At every level--personal, group, nation-oit is better to saturate the alleged evil-doer with our presence than to withdraw.~~'' The one exception she makes is in "the case of direct persona1 abuse where physical withdrawal is necessary for self- protection.""' Noddings argues that a woman who is being abused should stop accepting the abuse, and reject any belief that she deserves to be mistreated, but does not validate the option that the woman separate from the abusive man. 242 Noddings ' general moral invalidation ' of a woman ' s decision to separate from an abusive partner is related to her claim that moral behaviour arises from 'good' human tendencies, like empathy or compassion, whereas immoral

239 Ibid. , 113-114. 240 Ne1 Noddings, "A Response, Hvnatio, vol. 5, no. 1 (Spring 1990)~124.

Ibid., 242 Ibid. behaviour arises from 'evil' human tendencies, like cruelty or indifference. For Noddings, we must acknowledge and control the evil in ourselves, refusing to give heed to its demand~.~'~ She claims that in evaluating the moral worth of an action one should not ask what others would have done in the same situation, whether , that is, one ' s action is universalizable,244 In other words, one should not ask what is needed, to quote Miller, "to become a minimally polluting piece of moral equipment.w245 Noddings writes: "The quest should not be for judgment and vindication but for understanding and moral improvement. The questions should be something like these: What should 1 wish 1 could have done? If my best self had been able to respond, what would 1 have done?" On Noddings' view, striving to act according to one% best self requires an awareness of one's worst self or what impedes the manifestation of one's best self.z46 One may then discover that in acting in a particular way one was not one's best self; one could have acted better. Many of our purportedly moral actions meet Our own selfish wants and interests more than those of others. Consider the case of the

243 Noddings, Nomen and Evil, 32.

244 Ibid,, 210.

245 Miller, Eïoral Dsference~,381.

246 Ibid. 127 father who beats his chilàren for their 'own goodv, when such violence is actually an abuse of his power over them. Noddingsv contention that moral endeavour requires becoming attuned to onevs allegedly best self and acting according to it overlooks the fact that expressing 'goodl human potentialities may not be enough to produce moral goods. One's best self may in various situations actually be a manifestation of levil' tendencies, what would be generally considered depraved. To put it paradoxically, it might be best that onevs best intentions be @bad8. For instance, Noddings relays the story Simon Wiesenthal tells in his book Thelowx, of a Nazi soldier on his death bed who asks a young Jew for absolution for his war crimes .247 After a long and difficult mental struggle the Jew leaves the room in silence. But for many years after the Jew obsesses over his decision and wonders if he behaved badly. Noddings, not interested in the question of justification, maintains that the best response the Jew could have made would have been to express anger tempered by compassion toward the dying Nazi so as to produce if not a positive human relation at least l'a human-to-human encounter. The fact that the Jew is troubled by his choice indicates that he did not, Noddings argues, act in keeping with his best self; he did not act in accordance with his deeply held values: he did not act

with integrity. (As Miller would Say, he did not behave as the sort of person he should try to be.) Noddings' belief that the Jewgs best self was not expressed in his silence before the Nazi is a function of her belief that we perpetuate evil when see ourselves and others as symbols. The Jew does not forgive the Nazi because that would be like forgiving the Nazi regirne for their horrendous activities. But suppose the Jew has no misgivings concerning his behaviour toward the Nazi, that he thinks he did the right thing in view of the circumstances. As Noddings herself states, When we take a caring attitude toward ethical life . . . we do not believe that an ethical act on our part binds al1 humankind to act in the same fashion in like

situations. m249 Suppose that achieving "a human-to-human encounterw with the suppliant Nazi would have been seeing the Nazi as a person who did not freely and wilfully participate in essentially unforgivable atrocities. Expressing a 'human' response would have been like conveying the message that the Nazi's acts were not so horrendous, were pardonable after all. Noddings herself says of the ~azithat the "the language of mystification .. . had destroyed his better self ;1t250 the Nazi has no better self which the Jew can address and help to

24 9 Ibid., 186. 2 50 Ibid., 213. redeem. And if the self he does have is unequivocably bad, one need not and should not respond to wishes that ensue from it, in particular, a desire to be forgiven for his crimes. As Aristotle states: It is right for the good man to be self-loving, because then he will both be benefited himself by performing fine actions, and also help others. But it is not right for the bad man, because he will injure both himself and his neighbours by giving way to base feelings.w251 In my scenario the Jew does not Say anything to the Nazi because he finds it impossible to see the Nazi as little more (or less) than a symbol; he finds it impossible to inflict

anything but suffering on the Nazi to maintain a sense of integrity and to convey to others that the cruelties in which the Nazi participated should not be tolerated. In assuming a dichotomy between moral behaviour and its motivations, on the one hand, and immoral behaviour and its motivations, on the other, Noddings' account is reminiscent of traditional accounts of virtue and vice. On Noddingsl view, in perceiving herself as a relational self, and deriving her sense of self through relationships with others, the caring agent regards the abuse that is inflicted on her as harmful at once to her self, her abuser and their relationship. She mites: "An appropriately caring response from an abused woman

251 Aristotle, Nichornichean w,book nine, 1168b32- 1169a23, 302. 130 should be, 1 will not allow you to do this to me, you, us. "252 Noddings emphasizes: "Given the power relations in this society, she may not be able to carry through her commitment 'not to allow, ' but there is nothing in the ethic of caring itself that disables her. w253 On her view, withdrawal typically makes the abused woman feel self-righteous and does not serve "to alleviate the eviP but only to aggravate it as the abuser is left to find comfort among those who support his behaviour .254 Essentially, withdrawal does nothing in the way of helping the abuser overcome his dest~ctiveness. As this account assumes that the abused woman has some responsibility for changing her abuser, it promotes the female virtue of servitude.

mer, Noddings recommends surrounding the abuser '?with loving models who would not tolerate abuse in their presence and would strongly disapprove of it whenever it occurred in their absence. t1255 But it is diff icult to see how, in many cases, this recommendation could be implemented at a practical level. Given that women who are in relationships with abusive men often have low self-esteem, and do think that they merit mistreatment, it is quite likely that a woman who is being

'" Noddings, "A Response, 125, emphasis in original. 253 Ibid. 2 54 Ibid., 124.

255 Ibid., 125. 131 abused will simply not have any "loving modelsmn And if she does have them, they will have to be prepared for the possibility of having to do a lot of 'love sittingW because, as Noddings surely recognizes, getting a person to stop his abuse can be a long and typically complicated process. Abuse is not something that can simply be isolated from a personus personality without addressing other aspects of it. As Hoagland puts it pointedly in her critique of Noddings: 'The idea seems to be that the man who rapes his daughters, for example, is otherwise quite a decent fel10w.~''~

On HoaglandWs view, rather than diminishing her ethical self, a woman who separates from an abusive partner actually enhances this sel^'^^ The woman recognizes that her partner is destructive and rejects him. Of course, just because she ends one bad relationship does not mean that she will not start another; to claim that she progresses morally does not preclude the possibility of setbacks in the future. However, such setbacks would not discredit this particular moral achievement. While, as Noddings claims, there may be IWnothing in the ethic of caring itselfw that prevents a woman from ending her partnerWs abuse while remaining committed to him,258 there may be nothing in the situation itself that would give

256 Sarah Hoagland, "Some Thoughts About Caring," 1st E-, 256. 2 57 Ibid. Noddings , "A Response, 125. 132 her reason to think that staying would bring her anything except consicierable harm.

6. Evil as Violence and Victimization; Evil as Male and as Patriarchy

Mullett contends that in contrast to impartialist ethics, which maintains a very distant relationship with evil (in its phenomenal forms), keeping it well out of sight, feminist theory looks at it unflinchingly, stressing the moral relevance of the fact that much harm is the result of 'evil' human tendencie~.~"While it cannot be denied that care ethics directly confronts evil in concentrating on pain, separation and helplessness, the specif ic f orms of evil that Noddings deals with at length in h,such as war, terrorism, torture and psychological abuse, make her account female-centred but not feminist. By this 1 mean that it is informed by womenls perspective in the sense that women traditionally have largely occupied life-enhancing roles, caring for the sick, wounded and abused. But preserving a self that is defined mainly in terms of the needs and interests of others for whom one cares is not the same as

------2 59 Mullett, "Shifting PerspectiverW 114. preseming a self that is governed by the needs and interests of women. Since Noddings does not highlight harm against women, her account is not feminist. As Alison Jaggar claims, "the feminine is not the feminist, " so that any attempt to ground feminist ethics in a sweeping reevaluation, or valorization, of what has been socially constmcted as feminine is bound to be unsuccessful.260 If patriarchal culture is to be supplanted with a new order, the land needs to be completely cleared, Jaggar mites, fifiAlthoughfeminist ethics may begin with feminine ethics, it cannot end with it.fifi261In the project of critically examining and challenging patriarchal culture, it is important to understand the ways in which its various masculine and feminine facets interlock, how for instance, the socially prescribed role "domestic wifew perfectly complements that of "male breadwinner" in the public ~phere.'~' But as Jaggar emphasizes, feminist ethics, to be appropriately so

2 60 Alison Jaggar, "Feminist Ethics," 92.

2 61 Ibid., 92.

262 See Hoagland , fifisorneThoughts About fi Caring ' ," wmShe argues that the feminine is ineffectual for redressing the problems brought on by the dominance of the masculine since as a product of the masculine, patriarchal world, the feminine supports and nurtures the masculine. A clear example of this is the mother who raises a son to embrace military values and become a soldier to fight and kill in wars. For a discussion of mothering and its liabilities see Sara Ruddick, Materna1 Thinking: Towd a Polmcs. . of Peace (New York: Ballantine Books, 1989) . 134 called, must be explicitly committed to challenging male bias in ethics, evident in specific clairns or assumptions that invalidate woments interests,263 In so far as care ethics leaves intact the female virtue of servitude, it does not significantly challenge male bias in ethics. Referring to the radical alteration of consciousness that feminist ethical theory demands, Mullett writes: Feminist moral consciousness begins with an anguished awareness of violence, victimization and pain. The highly developed capacity of human beings to avoid painful experience, to ignore, suppress, deny, and forget

the agonies of life, is shifted aside and they fil1 our consciousness. We lose our moral callousness and see the violence around us: 'It is astonishing to note the profound silence in ethics regarding violence against women-rape, battering, child sexual abuse and incest ...

This silence must be broken. wq264 Feminist theory involves fundamentally both a turn inwards, a discovery of resources and affirmation of female powers, and a turn outwards to other women with whom one can engage in meaning-making, finding commonalities in experiences. 265

263 Ibid., 90.

2 64 Mullett, "Shifting Perspective," 114.

265 ~arilynFrye, "The ~ossibilityof Feminist TheoryfW Willful, 59-75. 135 Feminist theory involves fundamentally both a turn inwards, a discovery of resources and affirmation of female powers, and a turn outwards to other women with whom one can engage in

meaning-making, finding commonalities in experiences. 265

According to Marilyn Frye, feminist theory is about identifying and explaining the forces sustaining "the subordination of women to menw8266and justifying the need for women to separate Vrom men and from institutions, relationships, roles and activities which are male-defined, male-dominated or operating for the benefit of males and the maintenance of inale-privilege.1v267She concentrates on evil as maleness, "hardened into straight masculinity, gay hypermasculinity or effemina~y,~'~~and as patriarchy: ImSeeing [the mechanisms of exploitation and enslavement] as harmful is fundamental to my belief that women's being subjected to such machinations is an evil .11269 On her view, the feminist moral agent challenges patriarchal laws, principles and taboos and pursues alternate values- In the case discussed earlier

2 65 Marilyn Frye, "The Possibility of Feminist Theory," wj ~~ vw,59-75. 266 Marilyn Frye, me Politics. . of Realjtvmavs Theory (Freedom, california: Crossing Press.1983) xi . 2 67 Ibid., 96.

268 Ibid., 146.

269 Ibid., 52, emphasis in original. 13 6 involving a woman in an abusive relationship, she, like Hoagland, would maintain that in leaving the relationship the woman grows ethically. In breaking a commitment with her abusive partner, and denying him her care, she acts to empower herself: When women separate (withdraw, break out, regroup, transcend .. . ) we are simultaneously controlling access and definingw new boundaries, relationships and roles. 270 Essentially, Frye presents the female moral agent as confronting and battling patriarchy and maleness, and thus identifies a force or forces external to women as the cause or causes of women s oppression. In understanding womenfs oppression, she emphasizes women's victimization: "the forces of men's material and perceptual violence mold Woman to dependence upon Man. ft is not rash to speculate that without this force, much, most or al1 of what most or al1 of us are and do would not be ... subordinate to any man or what belongs to or pertains to a man, men or rna~culinity.~~'~~Similarly , Sandra Bartky writes : Feminist consciousness is consciousness of victimization-

To apprehend oneself as victim is to be aware of an alien and hostile force outside of oneself which is responsible for the blatantly unjust treatment of women and which

enf orces a stif ling and oppressive system of sex-role

270 Ibid. , 107. 27 1 Ibid., 77. 137 differentiation. For some feminists, this hostile power

is 'societyl or 'the system' ; for others, it is simply men. 272 Bartky does acknowledge that feminist consciousness may also involve a consciousness of privilege such as white-skin privilege in a white woman and thus of one's implication in the victimization of others. 273 But for her, consciousness of victimization is the hallmark of feminist consciousness: "In sum, feminist consciousness is the consciousness of a being . . . who sees herself as victim and whose victimization determines her being-in-the-world as resistance, wariness and suspicion. w274 On Bartky s view, feminist consciousness is somewhat paranoid, where one is continually on the defensive, wary of sexist attack or disparagement, and of oneself, about one's anger from sexist injury being vented in "imprudentttor wdangerousllaggressive behavior. 275 Both Bartky's and Frye's accounts of feminism may be seen as subscribing to what might be called a Veactive mode1 of emp~werment.~~Their emphasis on womenvs victimization under patriarchy, rather than on their survival, presents women,

... Sanàra Bartky, mtyand Domtjon: S~RSin e pmmeno-of? (New York: Routledge, 1990) , 15, emphasis in original . 27 3 Bartky Femlninity... and Domination, 274 Ibid. , 27 5 Ibid. , 138 however unwittingly, as passive objects on which oppressive forces act rather than as already existing forces with which these operate. Frye mites: "Feminists have tried to create separate spaces where women could exist somewhat sheltered from the prevailing winds of patriarchal culture and try to stand up straight for once. m276 Like Bartky, she portrays women under oppression as stooped, shielding themselves against harms .277 For Bartky, feminist consciousness is consciousness of the possibility of "the release of energy long s~ppressed,'*~~~not that of mobilizing energy already manifest. As will be seen in the next chapter, my own feminist ethics also relies on the concept of evil as patriarchy but it does not equate patriarchy with maleness, unlike Frye's account which uses the terms wpatriarchalm and "male-definedw interchangeably. This is owing to my emphasis on womenls survival under oppression rather than on their victimization. Instead of seeing a woman as stooped under oppression,

'standing up straightl only in female-defined spaces,279 1 prefer to see her as the underdog in a boxing match, being stnck down again and again but somehow managing to get up and

276 Ibid., 38.

277 It should be acknowledged, however, that the image of a stooped woman under patriarchy--- aptly expresses the fact that in a male dominated society women are hindered from achieving emotional, psychological, or intellectual growth. 278 Bartky, -tv . . . and Dom, 16. 279 Frye, Po~tics. . of m,38. 139 continue on. Feminist consciousness is as offensive as it is defensive. I do not identify abstract society or the system as primary evil but rather more specifically oppressive, sexist,

racist, and capitalist structures. Because 1 maintain that what is usually regarded as evil, such as killing, can sometimes be morally good (and not simply morally justified), my account involves a divided attitude toward the concepts of evil as pain, separation, and violence. In advancinq a feminist account I naturally reject the view of evil that demonizes femaleness, though, of course, this does not mean

that 1 think that women cannot express 'evi18 or aggressive potentialities. The view that women can and should in certain circumstances express such potentialities, even when from a perspective of justice this would seem ill-advised, with the result of punitive consequences, is one that 1 have been promoting throughout this thesis. Since women have been traditionally associated with the material and bodily realm,

1 also naturally reject the concept of evil that devalues that realm. Further, in seeking to fully displace a patriarchal vision in ethics by an enlightened, feminist one, I ernbrace evil as the absence of knowledge wholeheartedly. As for evil as disobedience, 1 turn this full circle, calling for an overthrow of traditional morality with the assistance of one of history's most daring 'moral shakers8--Machiavellia CHAPTER 5: FEMIMIST ETHICS AND MACHIAVELLI

In contemplating the future of feminist ethics, Jaggar identifies two assumptions that al1 feminist approaches to ethics must share: Yhat the subordination of women is morally wrong;I1 and Vhat the moral experience of women should be treated as respectfully as the moral experience of men.w280The claim advanced in the second assumption is not that there is some universal moral experience of women but that women'ç experience as informed by sexual oppression may make them uniquely qualif ied for identifying male bias in ethics. Jaggar claims that these assumptions ground a practical agenda for feminist ethics: Y irst, to articulate moral critiques of actions and practices that perpetuate women8s subordination; second, to prescribe morally justifiable ways of resisting such actions and practices; and third, to envision morally desirable alternatives that will promote women's emancipation. I1 With these considerations in mind, in this chapter 1 will argue that while some current feminist approaches to ethics challenge traditional conceptions of female virtues which promote subservient roles for women, their attempt to transcend traditional moral frameworks requires more force. Their insight that deviant behaviour can

280 Jaggar, "Feminist Ethics," 98. 141 have moral value needs to be pushed further in keeping with feminist ethicd practical agenda of empowering women and other oppressed groups. 1 will show that feminist ethics can benefit from Machiavelli% thought, and provide a sketch of a feminist Machiavellian account of morality, drawing particularly on Sarah Hoaglandls Lesbim Eaics and Antonio

Gramsci 's discussion of me Pri,~ice.

Hoagland, as lesbian separatist, also, like Frye, posits men and patriarchy as primarily evils, claiming that breaking away from men and patriarchal institutions is necessary for constructing an alternative ethics. But she does not present women under oppression as victims. In LaEthiçs she argues that portraying women as victims ignores their choices under oppressive conditions and thus denies their moral agency. While coerced in such circumstances, women must nonetheless act, making good or bad choices on the basis of their needs and resources.281 Some women pursue femininity and cornpletely align their interests with those of men, believing that they can only find value and meaning in their existence as subordinate persons with limited options. Others embrace

281 Hoagland, Leçbian Ethics, 50.

282 Ibid., 51. 142 femininity, simmering on the back burner of men's wants and projects, gently warming male egos in the pursuit of feminist goals. 283 Both of these types of choices, she emphasizes, no less than the choice to focus completely on women and womenls pro jects , are %urvival choices .w284 It should be acknowledged that Frye advances a similar point in her discussion on female sexual slavery, where she argues that a woman may act in a self-sacrificinq way out of survival if she is in a situation where she cannot, or reasonably believes she cannot , survive without the other s provision and protection, and where the experience has

made it credible to her that the other may kill her or

abandon her if and when she displeases him. 28 5 But while Frye maintains that in such cases a woman acts out of self-interest, she emphasizes that she grafts her self- interest ont0 her male provider, losing her own sense of identity: "She now sees with his eye, his arrogant eye.~"~ The implication is that her survival is not ultimately based on her own inner resources: she is at bottom a victim, travelling passively through life.

28 3 Ibid., 53.

284 Ibid., 53.

28 5 9 m Frw, Polatics of Rwlitv, 73. 28 6 Ibid., 74, emphasis in original. 143

Unlike feminists who portray women as victims, Hoagland does not assume a dualism between freedom and oppression, where moral agency is a matter of exercising power over forces such as men and patriarchy that are judged to be alien. On her view, moral agency does not involve an ability to choose under conditions that do not limit this ability, but rather an ability to choose in limited situations. 287 Contrary to impartialist ethics, Hoagland maintains that one need not and should not strive to transcend the boundaries of particular situations in order to exert moral agency.'" Such limits are actually deeply relevant for moral agency in that they help us "create value through what we choose, and to conceive of outselves as ones who are able to make choices; wz09 "contexts, in other words . .. help us give form to and create depth of mea~~ing.~~~~~Specific situations may be seen as providing opportunities for the discovery of new sorts of moral possibilities, of values that will undermine women's oppression, such as the value of separating from men and male- defined institutions. Hoagland writes: "It is through understanding the boundaries and limits of our paths, that we can, by means of

207 Ibid., 231.

'Oe ~bid.

289 Ibid. 2 90 Ibid., 232. 144

our choices, and interactions, seek to transform our selves in certain respects and hence to change certain boundaries and

1 imits .11'91 On Hoaglandîs view, although moral agency is consistent with an acknowledgment of persona1 constraints, and is actually informed by them, we do not have to relate to each other antagonistically as we corne to better understand these boundaries. Rather we can perceive ourselves as acting in cooperative relations with others. Acknowledging our boundaries involves, in part, acknowledging Our separateness and distinctness from others but also appreciating a need for

others to help us expand our boundarie~:'~~"By perceiving our selves as one among many, . .. we can perceive our possibilities as enhanced by our engagement with others, engagements which create possibilities that did not exist before. w293 In seeing each other as one oppressed woman among many, women can unite in solidarity to challenge oppressive structures in protests, support networks, crisis centres, and battered women refuges, challenges that could not emerge in isolation. In understanding their boundaries and limits as women, the ways in which their paths are constricted, and seeking to expand these, they can discover new possibilities of moral value and thus achieve greater resistance under

. --- 291 Ibid., 232.

292 Ibid., 241.

293 Ibid., 238. 145 oppression. Perceiving ourselves in cooperative relations with others becomes a problem when others view us antagonistically and assume an inherent conflict of interests with us. While there are certainly communities where people regard each other as functioning in cooperative relations, such as lesbian communities, with which Hoagland is concerned, it is dangerous to adopt this attitude in the dominant world. Hoagland is well aware of this, as is shown in her discussion of wife abuse, discussed in the last chapter. Although when faced with others that have power over oneself, one has little choice but to submit to their way of seeing, this does not necessarily mean that one's persona1 boundaries are defeated or lose al1 force. As Hoagland daims, developing a sense of our boundaries involves becoming better aware of when others are ~trespassingl'over these "and, if they have power over us, of ways to retain Our moral sense of self despite the trespass. m294 Preserving Our ability to make choices as moral agents can be very difficult, Hoagland argues, when people are so manipulated under oppression to internalize the values of dominance and subordination that they act in a way that destroys their systems of values. She gives the example of the hero of * 's choice who, while in a concentration

294 Ibid., 240. 146 camp, is told that she must choose which of her two children will be killed; otherwise both children will die. 295 She chooses that her daughter be killed and as a result her son is spared. Another example she presents involves Lucy Andrews, who petitioned the South Carolina government to let her become a slave.296 She was very young, only sixteen years old, with two children, without employment and without permanent adàress .297 It is tme that in certain cases like the ones Hoagland describes the agents are so constrained, the options are so bad, that there is no possibility for the discovery of any new sorts of moral insights, aside from the realization that the situation one is in is so demoralizing that there are no acceptable choice~.'~~But while it is potentially dangerous to assume a cooperative attitude when this attitude is not reciprocated, accepting the dominantjsubordinate framework need not always involve de-moralization. Separating from this framework is one way of avoiding demoralization, as when a woman leaves an abusive partner. But sometimes separation is not enough, as Hoagland recognizes: "1 am not saying that we can successfully separate ourselves and resist demoralization

2 95 Ibid., 209.

396 Ibid., 209.

2 97 Ibid., 209.

2 98 Ibid., 215. in al1 oppressive circumstance~.~~~~Sometimes, in order to challenge oppression a woman must resort to "the master's tools , "'O0 iinding new values within the dominant/subordinate framework. Sometimes, by not separating from the dominant belief system, we can challenge oppression.

The position 1 am defending is in a significant sense

Machiavellian. As Arlene Saxonhouse argues, in both his political writings and plays, ~achiavelli challenges traditional understandings of good and evil, of virtue and vice, addressing particularly the different virtues and vices associated with men and women.301 This reassessment proceeds from a rejection of classic utopian thought, which derives ethical principles from a vision of a perfect society. For Machiavelli, praiseworthy behaviour is not based on knowledge of the Fo~s,in particular of the Good, which affords clear insight into moral rightness and wrongness, but on unadorned truths of human social behavior. As a hard realist, he fully

Ibid. ,

'O0 Audre Lorde, "The Master's Tools Will Never ~ismantïe the Master's House. çister ~u~sjcler_:ssavsand S~aecheç (Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1984) 112.

301 Arlene W. Saxonhouse, Women the _Hiçtorv QE cal Thou t Greece to Wavelli.. Gen. eds. Rita Mae Kelly and Ruth B. Mandel (New York: Praegers Publishers, 1985) 152. acknowledges the presence of selfishness, dishonesty, and cruelty in the world and sees it as absolutely necessary to take into account when one is considering how to act: Vor how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather learn to bring about his own ruin than his prese~ation~~~~~;"For a man who wants to make a profession of good in al1 regards must corne to ruin among so many who are not good .11303 People are not, as a matter of fact, motivated more so than not by benevolent intentions. And to strive to remain pure when contending with so much impurity is foolhardy and irrational: IWIf one considers well, it will be found that some things which seem virtues would, if followed, lead to one's ruin, and some others which appear vices result in one's greater security and well being . For Machiavelli, what appears to be condemnable and vicious when examined in itself sometimes seems praiseworthy and beneficial when seen in a specific context. Like Hoagland, he emphasizes the creation of values in contexts. He constructs a bridge connecting virtue and vice, between which he travels procuring ingredients for the stability and happiness both of the prince and of the people. As Harvey

'O2 Niccolo Machiavelli, me Pr-, Trans. Luigi Ricci (New York: Na1 Penguin Inc., 1980) 84.

303 Ibid., 61. 304 Ibid., 85. Mansfield argues, his account of virtue sharply contrasts with that of Aristotle, which presents virtues as separate and distinct from vices, as the mean between two extremes. 305 Whereas for Aristotle, virtue is its own reward, for Machiavelli virtue has a definite practical function: virtue is not the end of human life but a means fox bettering it: l'The really good things are those that do good for the greatest number, and in which the greatest number find satisfaction. "'O6 On Aristotle ' s view, the virtuous character consistently realizes the moral mean. Machiavelli, on the other hand, recommends a more mobile character, able to move freely between extremes: "Thus it is well to seem merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualitie~.~'~' Thus he stresses that a prince must learn how to alternate between two natures: the man and the beast, into which he introduces a second division between the fox and the lion to advise on cunnirig and ferocity. Unlike Plato, Machiavelli does not presume some hierarchy in human nature, according to which a rational, human part rules over an emotional, bestial part. Calm reason does not govern the

305 Harvey C. Mansfield, Machiavelliia Virtue (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1996) 18.

306 Machiavelli, The Prince, 31. 307 Ibid., 93. 150 passions and allow them to be expressed in moderation: both parts must be equally strong and able to overcome the otherVs demands. He mites: "the prince must know how to use both natures and .. . the one without the other is not durable. Throughout Pr- Machiavelli stresses a distinction between cruelty used for good ends and cruelty used for bad ends, maintaining that the former kind is strategically wise whereas the latter is strategically foolhardy. A prince must, above all, strive not to be hated by the people and one who indulges in cruelty, who performs cruel acts when these are not necessary for conserving a state, will inevitably come to a brutal end. In the nineteenth chapter of Machiavelli gives several examples of princes overthrown because of excessive ferocity and cruelty. Antoninus, he states, was "a man of great abilityw and possessed admirable traits that made him popular with both the people and the soldiers. 309 But his rapacity was so great, having llcauseda large part of the population of Rome and al1 that of

Alexandria to be killed, that he becarne hated by al1 the world and ... was finally killed by a centurion in the midst of his army .w310 Further, in Piscourses Machiavelli, in admonishing princes against excessive pride, explicitly states: "To bring

308 Ibid,, 92.

'O9 Ibid., 101. Ibid. hatred on himself without any return is in every way rash and impr~dent.~"' In the cases of outrageously cruel leaders,

these leaders pursue ends-sadism for the sake of sadistic - pleasure--mat Machiavelli rejects as beyond the realm of the political. He writes: ''Let a prince therefore aim at conquering and maintaining the state and the means will always

be judged honourable and praised by everyone. w"' Clearly, Machiavelli has a specific end in mind when he states that "in the actions of men, and especially of princes, ...the end justifies the means.'"' Machiavelli makes a clear distinction between well-used and ill-used cruelty in his discussion on Agathocles, where he

claims : It cannot be called virtue to kill one's fellow-citizens, betray one's friends, be without faith, without pity, without religion; by these methods one may indeed gain power, but not glory. For if the virtues of Agathocles in braving and overcoming perils, and his greatness of sou1 in supporting and surmounting obstacles be considered, one sees no reason for holding him inferior to any of the most renowned captains. Nonetheless, his

311 Niccolo Machiavelli, "Discourses on the ~irstDecade of Titus LiviusIfi8wavelfi: The ~hiefWor- and Others, trans. Allan Gilbert (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1965) 3.24, 485.

Machiavelli, me Pr-, 94.

'13 Ibid. 152 savage cruelty and inhumanity, with his infinite crimes, prevent him from being considered among men of great excellence .314 The ability to use cruel techniques, like bravery or greatness of soul, does not alone make for a great prince. Having lost sight of the true role of the prince-to be harsh or cruel only when constrained--Agathocles could not be considered a truly great prince. Further , in Diçcours ~achiavelli considers whether sternness or kindness is better in a prince, and discusses two generals: Manlius Torquatus, who was very harsh toward his soldiers, never allowing them any break in their work, and Valerius Corvinus, who maintained his soldiers' obedience through affability and kindness. 315 He concludes, rather tentatively, that harshness as a method for preserving the state is better than kindness: ww[Manliust]way is wholly for the benefit of the state and does not in any respect regard private ambition, since by his way a leader cannot gain partisans, for he shows himself always harsh to everybody and loves solely the common good.~"~ But, he emphasizes, when it cornes to judging who is the better prince, Valerius is, without hesitation, to be preferred: "for a prince ought to

... "' Ibid., 60.

31 5 Machiavelli , The Discourses, 3.22, 379. 316 Ibid., 3.22, 483. 153 seek in hiç soldiers and in his subjects obedience and love. .. . For a prince to be in high favor as an individual and to have the army as his partisan harmonizes with al1 the other demands of his position. dl7 Just as too much hardness in a prince can cause his ruin, as in the case of Antonius discussed above, too much kindness can also cause a prince's downfall. Pier Soderini, a pleasant and amicable prince like Valerius, believed that through persistent goodness and patience he could put an end to evil factions. Because he refused to be Brutus-like he could no longer keep the state safe and lost his position and reputation. 3'8 Machiavelli mites: "He should never have allowed an evil to continue for the sake of a good, when that evil could easily crush that good ,3 19 In contrast, when Scipiols soldiers and friends rebelled against him out of restlessness and fearlessness,

Scipio wisely restored order by becoming fearsome and turning to cruel methods that he had previously avoided. 320 The crux for Machiavelli is toward what aim 'evil' is being expreççed. Nietzsche makes a similar point in criticizing Christianity: Ultimately the point is to what end a lie is told. That

. .. . - - -..-..p. -- -.--. Ibid. 318 Ibid., 3.3, 425,

'19 Ibid. , my emphasis.

"O Ibid., 3.21, 478. gholy' ends are lacking in ~hristianityis my objection to its means. Only bad ends: the poisoning, slandering, denying of life, contempt for the body, the denigration and self-violation of [humanity] through the concept sin- -consequently its means too are bad.~'~' In maintaining the state, a prince is not justified in uçing any means whatsoever. When the prince does not have as his end maintaining the state but more precisely the destruction of a people, to quote Nietzsche, "the denigration and self- violation of [humanity] ," the means must also be bad. Sartre also amplifies the kind of point Machiavelli is making in Notebooks for an Etucs. He claims that to choose tu attain an end by any means whatsoever is not to choose Vhe universe of violencetg if means other than violence (e. g. , honesty, cooperation, deception, theft) are sufficient to realize the end. He states that in deciding to steal food to relieve his hunger it is not a matter of determining to use any means whatsoever to realise this end.3z' Certain means, Sartre states, such as murder and burglary, are not ~onsidered.~'~These are excluded, it seems, because he knows that theft will be sufficient to realize his end: "So 1 go

32 1 . . Nietzsche, -t of the TdQIS, Nietzsche, section 56, 642, emphasis in original.- 322 Jean-Paul Sartre, Hotebooks for an ~tm.trans. David Pellauer (Chicago: The University of chkago Press) 244.

323 Ibid. 155 out, detennined to steal something from a grocery that 1 know quite well and where 1 have noticed one can steal something without being seen. fv324 Sartre illustrates two different meanings of the formula "the end justifies the means, arguing that the formula8s meaning depends on the context in which it is applied. He claims that if he is dying of thirst and cornes upon a bottle that he cannot open, the violence of breaking its neck does not change the end of satisfying his urgent thirst.'*' Breaking the bottle's neck has no effect on the end of relieving extreme thirst since it is required for that end to be achieved. If, however , he claims , he is invited for a drink with friends, breaking the bottle in this context does change the end of social drinking, based on an adherence to certain rules, in particular those demanding the respectful use of objects. 326 The goal changes from social drinking to orgy, so that violence is both the means and part of the end: violence is used for the sake of violence. The first case, and not the second, captures the meaning of Machiavellifs recommendation of using 'evil' to realize morally good ends.

Just as in the first case, Sartre claims, violence "is

32 4 1bid .

325 Ibid., 172. 32 6 Ibid. 156 justified in that it is no longer really violence, w327 for Machiavelli, levil' that is required to realize good ends is justified since by virtue of its necessity it loses its status as (absolute) evil. The crude interpretation of the maxim "the end justifies the means,ll according to which it is thought that any means whatsaever, e-g., unnecessary violence, is justified by an end is unMachiavellian and is expressed in the second case. Machiavellits belief that so-called evil means are sometimes required to realize morally praiseworthy ends also appears in his plays. As Saxonhouse argues, in and Uzia, Machiavelli challenges and inverts traditional meanings of virtue and vice by depicting human beings as needing to let loose 'the beast' when human harmonies are disrupted. "' The plot of revolves on the quest of a young Florentine named Callimaco to secure the love of the beautiful Lucrezia, married to a stupid and foolish old man named Nicia. ~ucrezia and Nicia have been unsuccessfully trying to have children so Callimaco cunningly devises a scheme that will ensure both that Lucrezia bears Nicia a child and that he (Callimaco) gains access to her. Counting on

32 7 Ibid.

328 Saxonhouse, Arlene W . Wmenthe. t: ~ncientGreece. to Machiaveu. Gen. eds. Rita Mae Kelly and Ruth B. Mandel (New York: Praegers Publishers, 1985) , 162-175. Nicials gullibility, he tells him the falsehood that a via1 of mandragola will ensure Lucrezia1s fertility but that the first man to sleep with her will die. With the help of his servant, Lucrezia's mother and a friar, secured by promises of money, ~allimacomanages to be this first man. He professes his love to Lucrezia and promises to marry her. Lucrezia, in turn, much enjoys the young lover Callimaco. Seeing their mutual passion as a good, she reasons, being the clever woman that she is--("fit to rule a kingdomwXg)--that since uevill-- trickery and deceit-combined to produce good she had never known (Igbeing a complete stranger to love dealingsu),3'0 adultery is not unconditionally sinful after all. Feigning innocence, she says : ' Since your [Callimaco s] cunning, the folly of my husband, my motherls lack of scruple and the wickedness of my confessor have combined to make me do what 1 would

never have done on my own, 1 can only believe that some divine influence has willed this, and, as it is not for

me to resist what heaven decrees, 1 surrender.'"' With Callimacols friendship with her husband, Lucrezia and her lover will be able to be together whenever they please. The

329 Niccolo Machiavelli, -affola, -v Worh aveu, ed. and trans. J.R. Hale (London: Oxford University Press, 1961) act 1, 14.

330 Ibid., act 3, 36.

331 Ibid., act 5, 58. 158 value of faithfulness is subverted and replaced by that of adultery, proving itself, in this instance, to have far- reaching beneficial effects: Lucrezia has a virile lover; Callimaco has Lucrezia; Nicia will have the children he so longs for; Sostrata can be a proud granàxnother; and Friar Timoteo will profit financially through his association with the rich Nicia and ~allimaco.332 Just as when the end is acquiring and maintaining the state the means should be judged whonourable and praised by everyone,""' so also, when the aim is achieving and prese~inga harmonious household, should the means be similarly regarded. Through Lucreziafs acceptance of Callimaco--through her agency-universal happiness is secured. 334 As Saxonhouse states, Ifin the kingdom of her home she is not only fit to rule, she does ru1e.1~~~' Hanna Pitkin presents a very different account of the world of Machiavelli, maintaining that in it traditional female virtues are left unchallenged and remain intact. She claims that in MachiavelliVs plays young women are almost always presented as mere sex objects with no independent wills

3 32 Saxonhouse, #. . -, 168, 333 Machiavelli, TbS3 Pace, 94.

335 Ibid., 168. of their own. 336 In discussing Lucrezia, however, she does concede that she is not wholly passive, or without personality. 3 37 But she asserts that her characteristics are inconsistent and puz zling11338 and fail to produce a compelling portrait of Lucrezia as "a real person, a person in her own

right .w33g She mites, This paragon of virtue not only turns out to be so malleable in the hands of her foolish husband, wicked mother, and cornpt priest that she agrees to commit an obvious sin (which may still be within the bounds of credibility) but is transformed after one night with her lover into a resolute and competent adulteress who, without pangs of conscience, knows just how to arrange things so that she and her lover may continue to cuckold her husband as long as he lives, 340 Firstly, it certainly is the case that the Judeo-Christian tradition considers adultery a sin, that within the framework from which the concept of sin derives its meaning it is sinful. But it is not clear how in this particular case adultery is sinful in the sense of being morally wrong where

336 Hanna Fenichel Pitkin, Fortune is a Wo- (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984) 110-111. 337 Ibid., 111. 338 Ibid.

339 Ibid., 112. Ibid. , moral standards are not synonymous with previously established holy laws. In his emphasis on basing one's behaviour on how people act rather than on how they ought to act, Machiavelli rejects the view that moral action instantiates a vision of a perfect society. 34 1 It is with tongue in cheek that Machiavelli has Lucrezia Say: "1 can only believe that some divine influence has willed this, and, as it is not for me to resist what heaven decrees, 1 ~urrender.".'~' Lucrez ia progresses morally, knowing "how to arrange things," not so that she can continue to indulge in sin, but so that she can enjoy several goods which her revaluation of adultery, her new moral insight, has served to secure. In a world in which many are corrupt, it is self-destructive to pursue values that can only result in one's ruin, 34 3 The 81Song1vappearing as the epilogue of the play may be seen as articulating Lucrezials wise progression of mind: For he who denies himself pleasure, To live a life full of anguish and tears, Must be someone naively blind, Ignoring how the world deceives, And what devices fortune weaves

34 1 Saxonhouse, Romen in the Hiçtorv of Pol- . . 3l,h0~-, 152.

342 Machiavelli, Mandi,auola, act 5, 58.

34 3 Machiavelli, Pr-, 85. 161 To overtake and to ensnare mankind. 34 4 Pitkin assumes that the only alternative to conventional morality is corruption, which she sees Sostrata as embodying in advising Lucrezia to choose the best among bad ch~ices:'~~ ("1 have always heard it said that it is the part of a wise man to choose the lesser of two evils. If there is no other way to have children, then, conscience permitting, you must take this one. w346)In contrast, the mother in Machiavelligs play Cl iushe argues, is "an agent of virtue, of good and ~rder,~~'~'citing her as saying: "one ought to do good at al1 times, and it counts al1 the more when others are doing wrong. 18348 But Sofronia also says just after these words: "But it seems to me that when we do do good, it only works against us, w349 leaving some doubt about whether she really believes that doing 'good' is always good. As Pitkin acknowledges, Sofronia later on participates in 'evil' herself: t'Although she is an agent of morality, however, her methods are those of manipulation and deceit. . .. [She] controls the outcome

344 Machiavelli, -, epilogue, 61. 34 5 Pitkin, ;Formis_aw, 119. 346 Machiavelli, maaola, act 3, 28 . 347 Pitkin, Fortue j s a Wo-, 119. 348 Machiavelli, ÇIJ. zig, . Gter~W-ks of .Machiavelu, act 2, 80.

Ibid., act 2, 81. 162 through her beautiful cleverness ' . While u,like -, also involves the theme of romantic love and the pursuit of young female beauty, this theme merely serves as a backdrop for the display of female autonomy and power. A girl of unknown origins, Clizia cornes to live with Nicomaco and his wife Sofronia. Years later, she matures and Nicomaco and his son Cleandro both fa11 in love with her. Nicomaco tries to arrange for the young woman to marry his servant so that he can share her with him.

Sofronia, who becomes knowledgeable of her husbandvs infatuation and plans, devises a scheme to bring him to shame and to his senses. Her hatred and jealousy wdrive her on,"351 along with a host of other, equally strong levil' emotions.

As the Song at the end of Act 3 states: At the birth of every woman,

Her sou1 brings in its train Pride, deceit and hardness, Cruelty and disdain. With these to guide and help her She wins in every fight; And if she is inspired By jeaiousy or spite She plans and executes her will

Pitkin, 119. 351 Machiavelli, u,act 1, 75. 163 With superhuman might ."' Just as in the Wirtue' of faithfulness is supplanted by the @vicet of adultery, with fecund, beneficial effects, so also in Clizia the @virtuesl of love, honesty, kindness, gentleness, and forgiveness are surpassed by the

@vices@of pride, anger, deceit and cruelty, lending a superhuman aura. In the world of Machiavelli there is no natural order that determines that men must rule over women, that Sofronia should, as the f oolish Nicomaco daims, "act according to [his] r~le~~~~~--thatvirtue must balk at vice, and human beings must refrain from committing 'evill.354 Thus human beings must become like gods and decide what is good and right, casting off al1 superstitious legacies.

C. mavelli and Fe~is~. .

In Antonio Gramscils discussion of Machiavellifs politics he makes an important distinction between the "diplornatl@ and

"the politician. @@ Drawing on Hegel and Marx, he refers to the notion of Ileffective realityI1@meaning, the objective, given situation--@@what is. He wites : #*The diplomat can only move within an effective reality, since his specific activity is

3 52 Ibid., act 3, 99.

353 Ibid., act 3, 91.

3 54 Saxonhouse, in the Hiçtorv of pollt~cal. Tboushf;, 171. 164 not that of looking for new equilibriums, but of conserving an existing equilibrium within a certain judicial framew~rk.~'~~ The diplomat seeks to maintain the existing order, and the laws and rules by which it operates, not looking beyond that order and considering a different, possible order. The politician, by contrast, "wants to create new relations of forces and because of this cannot help concerning h-elf with

'what should be l, though not in the moralistic sense. w356 He is a creator or initiator, who does not seek to maintain the existing order but to establish a new order. Gramsci identifies Machiavelli as a politician, challenging the impartiality of existing laws and rules while rejecting impartiality itself. But as "a partisan with mighty passions, "'" he does not act simply on the basis of subjective whim. "He bases himself," Gramsci emphasizes, "on effective reality.m358 The difference between the diplomat and the politician is that whereas for the former Iweffective reality@* is "something static and immobile," for the latter 'lit is a relationship of forces in continuous movement and change of

"' Antonio Gramsci, "The Modern Prince: Essays on the Science of Politics in the Modern Agerw@The Modern Prince er Wr-, . . trans. ~ouisMarks (New York: International Publishers, 1975) 163. 356 Ibid. 3 57 Ibid. 350 Ibid. 165 equilibrium. d59 For instance, for the diplomat, socialist revolution is somethinq abstract, extenial to the capitalistic order, in no intrinsic relation with it. In contrast, for the politician, who wants to change the existing order, socialist revolution is a project that emerges within capitalism, from forces that can be made to stmggle against it. Gramsci writes:

To apply the will to the creation of a new balance of the really existing and operating forces, basing oneself on that particular force which one considers progressive, giving it the means to triumph, is still to move within the sphere of effective reality, but in order to dominate and overcome it (or contribute to this) .360 For example, the marxist politician perceives capitalism, in its institutions, as preventing the free development of people and productive powers. Judging the working class as the force that pushes forward, he seeks to mobilize that force against capitalism in the project of transforming the present. Thus

Gramsci concludes, "What should bel is therefore concrete.~~~' While in claiming that Machiavelli concerns himself with 'what should bel, Gramsci does not mean to imply that he is interested in moral ideals, his distinction between the

359 Ibid.

360 Ibid. 36'2 Ibid. 166 diplomat and the politician is helpful for identifying Machiavelli% contribution to ethics, in particular feminist ethics. ~achiavelli's account of good and evil, of virtue and vice, may be seen as political in attributing a political function to virtue, depicting the individual as an instrument of social change. In contrast, impartialist moral theories may be perceived as diplornatic. The moral agent they depict is bent on preserving the existing equilibrium, on ending conflicts through the application of impartial principles of justice. On a feminist Machiavellian account of morality, the moral agent is an active politician seeking to overcome the patriarchal order. Acutely aware of the continuous movement and change of equilibrium of existent forces, she strives for a new balance of these forces, basing herself Ifon that particular force which [she] considers progressive, giving it the means to triumph. As the existing dynamics of relations are subject to change, her disposition will be flexible so that when a situation calls for harm-producing action, for rage, cruelty or deceit-when challenging oppressive structures requires

'evil1--she will act accordingly: "[The prince] needs to have a spirit disposed to change as the winds of fortune and variations of things command him, and .. . not depart from

...... - -- 362 Gramsci, ibid. 167 good, when possible, but know how to enter into evil, when forced by necessity .m363 Instead of reacting to patriarchy as if to a force external to herself, the feminist, much like the judoist, mobilizes certain features of patriarchy to realize her own ends. In struggling against woments oppression, she makes use of certain aspects of female experience, products of that oppression. For example, women can mobilize the feminine trait of nurturing, directed under patriarchy toward sustaining patriarchal institutions like the male-headed family, in the interest of emancipatory female bonding. In maaola, Lucrezia, by using the female virtue of subservience, by being complicit in subverting her husband8s authority and playing the obedient and innocent wife, ultimately determines the outcome of events. 364 Also, in utSofronia mobilizes the female vices of pride, deceit, hardness, cruelty , disdain, jealousy and spite to overthrow her husbandls authority. The moral goodness that results in both plays does not simply consist in the large amount of happiness achieved but in the defeat of oppressive, patriarchal authority, which accords women only instrumental value. The actions of Lucrezia and ~ofroniaare not morally good simply because of the kinds of consequences that they produce but because they are expressions of self-respect. The

363 Machiavelli, The Pr-, 70. 364 Saxonhouse, Women the Hiçtary of polltlcfi. . Thou-, 169. 168 "Songm at the end of the play, which claims that those who refuse to engage in so-called evil for the sake of happiness are "naively blind,11365expresses Lucreziafs discovery of her right to self-determination, to determine the nature of her existence, an existence guided by enlightened choice (with eyes wide open) . Further, Sofronia, in humiliating her husband, also asserts her right to self-determination, to not have her householdls good name besmirched by her husbandls foolish, no longer exemplary, behaviour. In a speech soaring in feminist righteousness, she says: 1 never wanted to make a fool out of you [Nicomaco]; itls you who wanted to make fools of al1 the reçt of us, and

ended by making one of yourself! How could you not be ashamed to have brought up a girl in your own house, ... and then want to marry her off to a rotten good-for- nothing servant just because he wouldntt mind sleeping with her? Did you think you were dealing with ... people who didn't know how to put a stop to your wicked plans? . The only way to bring you to your senses was to ... shame you before witnesses. 366 Similarly, consider the hero "FloraW in the Machiavellian ... film me Polit- f4. w ife. Her husband, the leader of a national political party, is publicly revealed to have been

365 Machiavelli, tfMandragola," Song, 61. 366 Machiavelli, w,act 5, 116. 169 having an affair, unbeknownst to her but known to some of her friends al1 along. The dynamics of their relationship change; the equilibrium is disrupted. Taking advantage of others l perception of her as a pure and innocent dutiful wife she engages in deceit, cunning and manipulation, turning her husbandts supporters against him by feigning acceptance of her husbandts betrayal; enhances her femininity, giving herself a de-over; and indicates utmost devotion to her husband, lying ta a powerful friend that he had cheated on her in the past but she had forgiven him. As a result, she succeeds in getting her husband out of office and winning his position for herself. Again, deceit, cunning and manipulation are not in this instance morally good simply because of the results they produce, but because in playing "the fox," in seeking revenge, Flora recovers that aspect of herself which her husband's betrayal had devastated, namely, her self-worth. Flora cornes to realize that not only is her husbandvs monogamous commitment to her void but also his commitments to his children and political party, commitments which she shares and values greatly. In a poignant scene ber son asks her to define the soul. She considers the question very seriously and tells him to Say a prayer for her, uncertain of the morality of her behaviour but feeling she has no other choice. From the perspective of Flora and what circumstances make necessary to preserve her self-respect, causing her husbandts 170 downfall is morally required. Flora's enhancement of her femininity is not simply morally good because of the worthy ends she seeks to achieve by virtue of it--the downfall of her politically irresponsible husband, the integrity of the political party she supports, her own rise as the party's leader--but because (given the positive meaning she attaches to it) it is an assertion of self-worth, as if she were proclaiming her sexual desirability, which her husbandls af fair had challenged. Similarly, deceit and cunning are morally right in her situation, in part, because they too express self-respect, as if she were saying, "You think 1 am naive, child-like, and obedient, needing male protection; think again. 1 am not a mere puppet you can so easily make to accept my husbandls betrayal. 1 am a full grown, intelligent adult, with needs and feelings of my own which should be respected, not depreciated, not neglected." The deceitful practices Flora engages in would still have been morally right even if they had not produced the results she desired. Through understanding the boundaries of her situation Flora creates value through what she chooses, discovering new moral possibilities. The greater richness of Florals ideals causes her to refuse to be subordinate and self-sacrificing but also to recognize that whatever act is necessary to affirm her self-worth is morally right. By pushing out the limits of her situation with an enlarged ethical self, Flora succeeds in resisting demoralization and resignation under oppression. 17 1

But it cannot be denied that Flora avoids being demoralized precisely by moving within the dominant/subordinate framework and waging war on her husband. The more powerful, more independent self that she forges is one that recognizes the moral significance of levil' for the sake of good.

While in the examples discussed above 1 depict the moral agent as mobilizing aspects of female experience, products of womenls oppression, in the struggle against that oppression, the feminist moral agent is not limited to protecting and advancing woments interests alone. In fact, it is not clear what precisely that endeavor would mean, since women's systematic subordination intersects with other forms of oppression such as those based on class and race. Thus a feminist Machiavellian account of morality presents a moral agent who rnobilizes aspects of female/black/working-class experience in struggling against oppressive structures. Moving within the existing order, she judges the oppressed as that force which pushes forward, and acts in a way that furthers, their liberation. Admittedly, it is often very difficult to know what action will challenge oppressive structures or challenge them the most or whether a particular han-producing action is actually necessary to preserve one's self-worth and thus 172 morally good. In other words, we will not always know if a so-called evil action is necessary because of constraints or whether one that does less or no harm is sufficient, But this is not a problem peculiar to the kind of moral perspective being propounded here. For instance, in utilitarianism we may have difficulty deciding what action will produce the most happiness or how many people it will benefit. ~imilarly,in care ethics we often do not know what action is the most caring one, that expresses kindness or compassion rather than self-interest,

To be sure, 1 am not embracing a female moral agent who charges recklessly ahead to achieve her goals, knocking other women dom without a moment's pause. The end of maintaining self-worth is not justified by any means whatsoever. For instance, a woman applying for a job might justify sabotaging another women8s chances at it by claiming that her destructive action is required so that the other, more qualif ied woman will not get the job. However, the goal of securing a job is based on a notion of fair-play where a job candidate respects another candidate's right to seek the same job without interference. In sabotaging another womants efforts to obtain the job by, for instance, destroying her research files, a woman changes the goal of securing the job to vanquishing one's opponent as in war, where 'al1 is fairt. She uses @evil8 means to instantiate a vision in which others are either obstacles or instruments for one's use; she uses 'evil' 173 for a morally repugnant end. My characterization of the feminist moral agent as the underdog in a boxing match, presented in the last chapter, should be read at a purely metaphorical level. With this metaphor my intention is not to champion the masculine ideals embodied in male sports but to assert the value of behaviour that has traditionally been associated with masculinity, like aggressive behaviour, for the realization or defense of feminist ends. According to Jaggar, feminist ethics is wtransitional, a temporary adaptationmv367to a world overflowing in violence, cruelty , callousness--a tool for coping with and overcoming this world toward the creation of a world in which explicit feminist commitments no longer have a function. 368 Feminist approaches to ethics 'vmustrecognize the often unnoticed ways in which women and other members of the underclass have refused cooperation and opposed domination while acknowledging the inevitability of collusion and the impossibility of totally clean hands. w369 1 hope to have shown, with the examples of the characters Flora, Lucrezia, and Sofronia, that a feminist Machiavellian moral account does precisely this.

3 67 Jaggar , Veminist Ethics , 9 5.

3 68 Ibid., 97.

369 Jaggar, "Feminist Ethics, 98, emphasis in original. CHAPTER 6: 'NASTY1 EMOTIONS

On virginia Heldls view, "a feminist ethic will not just acknowledge emotion, as do ~tilitarians, as giving us the objectives toward which moral rationality can direct us; it will embrace emotion as providing at least a partial basis for morality itself. The emotions she identifies as moral guides for action are caring, sensitivity and respect for othersl feelings. 371 As a corollary of the Machiavellian position 1 presented in the last chapter, in this chapter 1 will defend a fuller appreciation of emotion, showing the potential value of Inegative1 emotions as moral illuminators.

In Chapter 1 1 claimed that a loving gaze is not always, or necessarily, appropriate in the active moral agent. The assumption to the contrary is part of a long standing tradition in ethical theory of denying that the expression of Inasty1 emotions can ever be a sign of moral fibre and strenqth. Ronald de Sousa for instance argues that emotions like "envy, motiveless malice, certain f orms of resentment, despair" are "ethically worthles~~~or "wholly nasty , Vedeemed neither by the motives they might induce, nor by any intrinsic pleasure they bring, nor by any contribution they

370 . * Held, Pemuilst Mora- , 52. '" Ibid. , 98. 175 make to correct ethical eval~ations.~~~'~De Sousa does, however, concede: "Perhaps, thougt;, no case is quite uncontroversial .1t373 While some philosophers, like Aristotle, see a role for anger in moral living, the kind of anger that is deemed permissible is tempered by calm reason. It is not intense anger in the form of rage. The person who gets angry appropriately will be a patient person, Aristotle maintains, I5nasmuch as patience is commendable, because a patient person tends to be unperturbed and not carried away by his feelings, but indignant only in the way and on the grounds and for the length of time that his principle prescribesewU4

The rejection of 'nasty' emotions and their moral and epistemic value is closely related to the denigration of the experiences of members of oppressed groups. Jaggar argues that subordinated individuals often find it difficult to experience socially sanctioned emotions like joy and contentment because of their disadvantaged, deprived situations. The negative emotions they do frequently

"' Ronald de Sousa, me wonality of Emoti~n (Cambridge, Massachusetts : MIT Press, 1987) 3 15. '' Ibid. experience, such as anger, are conventionally unacceptable, or what she calls "outlaw emotion~.'*~'~Outlaw emotions are based on perceptions and values that are at odds with those that inform the dominant ideology. For example, a woman is not likely to feel pleased or amused but rather uncornfortable and angry if a man says to her when she accidentally drops her books on the floor, "Let me help you with that, little lady." Outlaw emotions are epistemologically subversive, challenging what are taken to be facts, for example, that one is in a situation of heartfelt benevolence or concern instead of one of coercion, injustice, or danger. 37 6 Because they involve subversive observations, they can be politically subversive. As Elizabeth V. Spelman claims, emotions have both a feeling component and a cognitive component so that to Say that someone ought to feel angry would imply that she ought to make certain judgments, e.g., that she has been wronged, that she can become angry if she acquires the belief that another has committed an unjustified or harmful act against her, that injustices are the sorts of things one should be angry about. 377 In so far as anger in

37 5 Alison M. Jaggar, nLove and Knowledge: Emotion in Feminist Epistem~logy,~Women. Krlpwledae . , Eds. Ann Garry and , 1992) 144.

37 6 Jaggar , %ove and Knowledge, IV 145.

37 7 Spelman, IVAnger and ~nsubordination, " Yom- Reutv: E~oratio~~eminiçt. . p- eds. Ann Garry and Marilyn Pearsall (New York: Rutledge, 1992) 177 the oppressed is denied, or outlawed, their capacity to make judgments about wrongdoing, and thus their moral agency, is rej ected. 378

As F'rye claims, king angry implies not only the judgment that one has been mistreated but also certain judgments about oneself and the kind of king that one is. She writes: "Anger implies a daim to domain--a claim that one is a being whose purposes and activities require and create a web of objects, spaces, attitudes, and interests that is worthy of re~pect.""~ Frye presents the example of a woman at a gas station who had finally managed to get her carburetor properly adjusted when an attendant came along and started playing with it. The woman "was dismayed and sharply told him to stop. He became very agitated and yelled at her, calling her a crazy bit~h.~'"

Of this example Frye claims that the attendant did not give the wonan's anger uptake. He did not address her perception or her judgment that he was doing something wrong, as he would have done had he asked her why he should leave the carburettor alone. Instead, he superimposed a new subject ont0 the

269.

378 Ibid., 268. 37 9 Marilyn Frye, mitics. . of Real,

380 Ibid., 88.

"' Ibid., 89. 382 Ibid., 89. 178 issue of the carburetor and his behaviour, that of her character and sanity ."' Concerning Frye8s example, it may be added that the gas attendant, in experiencing the womanls legitimate anger as crazy, perceived it as blind, hysterical rage. In Spelmanls discussion of anger as being justified, or involving a judgment that one in some sense ought to be angry, she has in mind the Aristotelian anger tempered by calm reason, anger that endures for a long period of time, possibly years. She relates an instance of a woman who had been angry for five or six years about bad nursing care suffered by elderly women. 38 4 She mites: "If she had merely been in a rage, she would have lacked the clarity of vision fully compatible with anger; if she had not been angered by what she saw, she may not have been motivated to act. But as Spelman acknowledges, the line between anger and rage is often difficult to identify. 38 6 Further, she claims that a person in a rage tends to be completely absorbed in the object of her rage. 387 It would seem, however, that intense, 'blindl fixation, which excludes everything else, is not necessarily incompatible with clarity

- -

"' Ibid., 89. 384 Spelman, "Anger and Insubordination,@' 271. 385 Ibid., 271. 38 6 Ibid. 387 Ibid. 179 of vision. To return to an earlier example presented in

Chapter 1, a woman could be enraged at her husband8s beating of her child, feeling as if she were about to explode, but precisely because she is dominated by her anger she is able to put aside her love and loyalty to her husband and use force to stop him. In this case, a systematic, reflective consideration of the situation, e .g ., whether aggressive action would impair their rnarriage or her husbandls body, would be hazardous for the child. Here rage, not anger, is the morally required response, where she judges that her husband is committing literally mind-boggling, outrageous behaviour .

Because outlaw, or conventionally unacceptable, emotions assert claims to have one's moral agency taken seriously, they have a self-protective function, guarding a sense of self- respect. Regarding resentment , Solomon mites, I8It is surely the deadliest [sin], stagnating self-esteem and shrinking our world down to a tightly defensive coil, plotting and scheming to the exclusion even of pride. 88380 One feels thrown ' into an inferior existence, through no f ault of one1s own. A view of

380 Robert Solomon, sotioandthe ~eam~of J (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993) 290. the world in paranoid revolutionary terms; 'If yougre not on my side, you must be on the other ide'.^^'^ Consider again the case of Dick Gregory discussed in Chapter 3. His act of throwing the brick at the storekeeper's window would appear to stem from resentment, a sense of "intolerable inferiorityw in which one vengefully aims to overcome one's present inferior status and attain one of equality or even ~uperiority.'~~But it is precisely because his act expresses a revolutionary view of the world that it is an assertion not of inferiority but of pride; in protesting against the storekeeperts racist benevolence he challenges hierarchical divisions based on race. To put it bluntly, the storekeeper, with his racist behavior, really is 'on the other side.' For Gregory to recognize this is not a sign of paranoia but of healthy clear- sightedness . Consider a similar case found in the film A Girl's Town. In this film the character with her friends, vandalizes the car of a man who raped her. Emma spraypaints the word 'irapistu on the front of the car and throws a brick through one of the windows in protest against its owner8s sexual abuse. It is as if the view of the rapist's expensive, immaculate car intensifies her resentment to the point where she achieves the insight that men who commit rape should not

389 Ibid., 293. 390 Ibid., 292. 181 be allowed to continue their lives without distress while women are left to shoulder completely the burden of suffering they create, suffering which may be too heavy for some women to bear, like that of her friend ~ikkiwho co~nmitssuicide out of severe depression as a result of being raped. One might ob ject that surely Emmats resentment is irrational because of the violent course it takes, and that she should take the route of the law and press forma1 charges against the man who raped her. But certainly there is nothing irrational about the belief that those who commit brutal crimes should be made to suffer for them. One may, of course, regard her resentment as rational without finding her expression of it rational. ~bviously,when she throws the brick through the window she is not experiencing reflective calm, but extreme, blinding rage. But to continue my defense of rage presented in the last section, this does not mean that her behaviour is irrational, or reflects a lack of clarity of vision. Given that rapists are often not found guilty in a court of law and if they are, their punishment is mild compared to the punishment for other severe crimes (e. g ., attempted murder) , pursuing the avenue of the law may not result in the victimls empowerment. A woman who charges a man with rape might have to face a lot of hostility from others who may trivialize the crime or refuse to believe that the man indeed committed it, especially if the criminal is a well-respected member of society. Such hostility will make it difficult for the woman to recover from 182 the trauma and go on with her life, return to school, work, etc. 3g' Also, legal proceedings take tirne, and it may be that just as she is starting to feel better the court date arrives and she is flooded with intrusive, post-traumatic symptoms. 3 92 Thus Emma's destructive behaviour may be judged rational just as one would judge rational Emma's attempt to stop a man from raping her with the use of physical violence. Fighting to stop one's rape and getting small revenge against one's rapist are both equally non-excessive acts in the unconditional interest of one's self-integration. In another scene Emma decides to confront the man who raped Nikki, thinking that "he would look guilty, like he was paying for it." He smiles arrogantly at her and confesses nothing. Later on Emma and her two friends meet him outside as he is leaving his workplace, accusing him of the rape. He answers condescendingly and confidently that there must be some misunderstanding; this causes the women to attack him, Emma knees him in the groin and they leave him lying on the ground in pain. Was Emma morally wrong to do so? As 1 have been trying to show causing someone harm may sometimes be morally right and this is such a case since the perpetrator takes no responsibility for his act; he shows no remorse for his wrongdoing; and there is small or no likelihood of the

''l ''l Judith Lewis Herman, n-very (New York: Basic Books, 1992) 165.

392 Ibid. 183 wrong being 'righted' in the scales of justice, The character VattiW in Girl's Town also decides to retaliate against a man who has wronged her. The father of her child, from whom she has separated, has refused to pay child support. Out of resentment and rage, she, along with her female friends, steals valuable equipment from his apartment and pawns it for money at a local shop. Given that there is no law that can force the father of her child to pay child care and thus contribute to the child's well-being, stealing in this case is morally right. In this instance, as in the instance invoîving the destruction of the rapist's car, the young women experience a sense of joy in their expression of strong 'neqative' emotions, laughing and congratulating each other afterwards . This testifies to the sense of empowennent their levil' behaviour affords, Admittedly, there are many forms of resentment that are irredeemably nasty, but these are ones that incorporate inaccurate or incomplete perceptions and/or malicious attitudes: a male executive who resents a brilliant woman for being promoted ahead of him because he falsely believes women are intellectually inferior to men and that thus her promotion must be unfair; or a mother who resents her daughter because she has educational opportunities which she herself lacked. But as in the case of bitterness, for those whose self-esteem is very low to begin with, resentment with its painful 184 may be just the sort of thing needed to assist one in the fight for self-respect. According to a survey conducted in the early 1980s by Diana Russell, a well-known sociologist

and human rights activist, out of a random sample of over 900 women, one woman in four had ken raped and one woman in three

had been sexually abused as a ~hild.'~' Given pervasive sexual exploitation and the debilitating emotional effects for victims, such as negative self-esteem, many expressions of resentment will be morally right.

Another %astyl emotion that can be self-protective and

have moral value is bitterness. In What's Kïong with BitternessnlLynn McFall argues that bitterness is "a refusa1 to forgive and f~rget.~~'~~It is a response to the frustration

or disillusionment of one s important hopes. 396 While the

disappointment of trivial hopes, such as the hope that the new recipe one is trying out will prove appetizing, might produce

a sour word of annoyance, these will not become tallied up as wrongs or painfully etched on one's mind. In contrast, the

393 Solomon, me Passions, 295.

395 Lynn McFall , What s Wrong With Bitterness, Feminiçt. . u,ed., Claudia Card, 147. 396 Ibid. 185 repeated abuse one received from a tyrannical father will violently impress itself upon one a s mind, producinq nightmares, anxiety states, depression and low self-esteem so that one will perhaps almost feel forced to refer over and over to this major injustice of one's traumatized life. In this case bittemess would seem unavoidable and perfectly justified. In fact, as McFall argues, if one's towentor had no remorse for his cruelty, forgiveness would seem inappropriate, self-destructive, in the sense of expressing a lack of self-respect, 397 and, 1 would add, an indication of denial: the abused daughter does not want to admit that her father behaved badly toward her or maintains that she deserved such treatment. McFall claims that only the saintly (with their angelic wings) can rise above the disappointment of every cherished hope and escape bitterne~s."~ But she questions, as 1 have questioned throughout this thesis, whether saintliness is a desirable ideal. Instead of soaring through rose-coloured clouds, McFall asks, referring to a point which de Sousa makes, whether we have an emotional responsibility to "feel things as they really are. w399 On McFallls account, honest, direct expression of 'nastya emotion has an important function. She makes a distinction

...... ~....-~------.---.- 3 97 Ibid., 152.

390 Ibid., 153.

399 Ibid., her emphasis. 18 6 between passive and active bitterness. In the former, bitterness turns against oneself, making one unable to find much pleasure in living, spoiling even large successes: though one's novel has received a national award, one cannot fully absorb this happy occurrence and reminisces over past wrongs, e.g., "My high school English teacher told me 1 lacked the talent to be a writer." One does not confront the perpetrators of these wrongs and remains mute. Passive bitterness would seem akin to depression in its negative view of the world and its destructiveness toward pleasure. Active bitterness, on the other hand, is "a move away from self-deception and moral sïavery in the direction of t~th.~~"It is a refusai to Wear anotherts smile, the smile of dominant groups who have an interest in sustaining the illusion that the oppressed are happy with their lot. Where the truth is harsh, and of human origin, . . . bitterness is a form of moral accounting. N'~' While McFall stresses this positive aspect of bitterness she claims that bitterness is never a moral imperative and that love, if possible, is preferable. 'O2 But this claim is puzzling, given her claim that in some cases bitterness is a moral achievement, as in the bitterness of rape victims. 403

'O0 Ibid., 154.

401 Ibid., 156.

'O2 Ibid., 156.

403 Ibid., 152. 187

She quotes the narrator in John Hawkes1 Second Sm: "Perhaps

my father thought that by shooting off the top of my head he would force me to undergo some sort of transfiguration. But poor man, he forgot my capacity to 10ve.l"~' This sounds suspiciously like a case of moral saintliness, about which McFall herself expresses doubt just a few pages before. Love could be seen here as appropriate, when coupled with compassion and understanding. But, if no judgments of wrongdoing were made, if no feelings of bitterness were experienced at al1 in respect of factors, such as injustices, that contributed to the suicide, one would, to put it paradoxically, wonder about the depth of the son's love. Depending on the case, love might only be possible after bitterness has been given its due time and allowed to proceed unchecked, as when parents of children brutally killed seek justice for their loved ones and act to ensure that the perpetrators of these crimes are punished. For their own calm of mind this might be necessary. One might argue that it would be preferable if they could attenuate their rage and try to understand the causes behind such heinous acts, the cultural factors that contribute ta their occurrence, such as misogyny, inequality of wealth, emotionally deprived upbringing, promotion of male aggression and preying on the vulnerable. But as claimed in Chapter 1, moral saintliness is

404 Ibid., 156. 188 undesirable because it excludes deep persona1 commitments that are basic human goods, and having these commitments means that certain acts of wrongdoing, like the murder of a daughter, cal1 for certain emotional responses, such as bitterness, grief or rage. Imagine a parent saying calmly, immediately after hearing about the murder of her child, ttYes,we loved Cathy, but the ones responsible for her brutal death are not to be blamed. They are simply products of a sick society. We should point our fingers not at them but at ~ociety.~~One would wonder if the parent had a rather shallow commitment to her child.

As women are subject to so much abuse, in violent and in non-violent forms like sexual harassment, it would not be surprising to discover that they harbour some envy toward men who are not so categorically or summarily objectified. Since virtue depends on social circumstances, as Card argues, just as a poor person cannot be financially generous, conversely, a man who is treated as a full subject will not be envious of a woman who is not so treated. But envy need not always be seen as a moral failing, or as "ethically worthle~s,~'~~as those who subscribe to the discourse of moral damage would

405 Ronald de Sousa, -onal itv of Dotion, 314. 189 maintain.

In me Bluest Eve, by Toni Morrison, the protagonist Claudia and her sister Frieda are envious of their rich, white classrnate Maureen Peal: If she was cute-and if anything could be believed, she was-then we were not. . What was the secret? What did we lack? Why was it important? . .. Guileless and without vanity, we were still in love with ourselves then. We felt cornfortable in our skins ... and could not comprehend this unworthiness. ... Envy was a strange, new feeling for us."406 Solomon claims that envy is "an essentially vicious emotion, bitter and vindictive. 1'407 He states that one may be completely willing to admit that one has no right to the object of envy.'08 However, if one actually does deserve what the other has envy would seem an appropriate response. Claudia's and her sister1s envy of Maureen has a positive function, of making them uneasy about their relative lack of appreciation and enabling them to maintain a certain level of self-respect. As Aristotle suggests, anger is typically felt

406 Toni Morrison, "The Bluest Eye, me Norton Antholoqy e bv Women, Eds. Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar (New York: Norton, 1985) 2108, emphasis in original. 4 O7 Solomon, The Pwsions, 248. 4 O8 Ibid. toward those who are 'like' or 'equal' to us. 409 It is, Solomon mites, Itamong the very strongest competitive emotions .""' Similarly, as Hume maintains, one must judge the other to be in important respects like or equal to oneself in order to experience envy toward him. "A poet is not apt to envy a philosopher, or a poet of a different kind,""' just as a human being who judges herself to be of inferior race and beauty is not likely to envy someone she regards as a different, superior kind of human being by virtue of belonging to what is believed to be a different, superior kind of race. It is because Claudia and her sister believe that they are essentially equal to Maureen that they are envious of her and see themselves as just as deserving of the positive attention that Maureen receives. While Gabriele Taylor claims that envy is a "self- protective emotionw she maintains that the kind of self it protects is a deficient one. 4 12 Her reasons for arguing this do not take into account the social situatedness of the

4 O9 Aristotle, Ehetorj c (New York: G. P. Putnam1s Sons, 1926) 1386b, 35. 4 1 O Solomon, me, Pasiom, 248. 411 David Hume, -es . . Concermq Understw e.s of Moralç (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1963) 426.

Gabriele Taylor, "Envy and Jealousy: Emotions and Vices," Udwest Stwes _in Pulosopby- Vome XIJI: Mu : cwacter and Vjrt-, eds. Peter A. French, Theodore E. Uehling Jr., and Howard K. Wettstein (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988) 243. 191 individual, the variability of the contexts in which 'nastyt emotions like envy occur. She mites: [Envy] is experienced as frustration at not having what she thinks she needs, with consequent anger and resentment directed against the other. ... [Tlhe good (or kind of good) is thought to be needed not necessarily for its own sake, it is needed primarily to secure or boost the person' s self-esteem. .. . . The self to be protected is, in the person's own view, a defective self. What it lacks may be something she believes to be itself a requisite for being of worth: money, a certain social position, beauty, persona1 relationships, etc. Or it may be something which she thinks is needed to give her value in the eyes of others. ... Either way, her thoughts and desires when feeling envy are misdirected: her self- esteem is insecure because she thinks of herself as lacking that which would enable her to think well of herself. 413 Taylor attributes envy to a defect within the person experiencing it, which serves to ward off a revelation of one's shortcomings and the feelings that would attend it. 414 Throughout the passage above she seems to be assuming that self-esteem is not at al1 dependent for its strength on

Ibid. 414 Ibid. 192 external, social goods like money or social status but is wholly determined by inner, private thought, by thinking "of herself as lacking. 11''' However, it is difficult for a person to think well of herself if she lacks "money, a certain social position, beauty , persona1 relati~nships~~'~because in a patriarchal , capitalist society in which respect for persons tends to be reduced to respect for persons as possessors of socially valued characteristics, the appreciation of others will not likely be forthcoming: if she is poor others might see her as a lazy bum and if she lacks strong positive personal relationships she will have no one to help convince her otherwise. Far from being glmisdirected,11417 her envy may be in a certain sense well-targeted. Consider again Claudia's and her sister's envy toward Maureen. Maureen is rich and considered beautiful because of her fine clothes, her white skin and her green eyes. 4 18 Their stance toward Maureen would seem defensive. However, this is not so much because they fear their shortcomings will be revealed to themselves--that a defective self will be exposed- -but to protect a self that sees itself as essentially equal

'15 Ibid. 416 Ibid.

417 Ibid.

41s Morrison, "The Bluest Eye, 2100. 193 to the other. Taylor states that the "rational and straightforward responsew of the envious person mwould be for her to try to achieve that good, or, where this is not possible, corne to tenus with herself by finding other grounds for ~elf-esteern.~~'~But telling a person who does not have enough money to live on to find other sources of self-esteem when it is such a crucial good for one's health and well-being would be like a parent telling his child in perfect seriousness if she is not happy with their family to find another one. Taylor writes: Im[By] directing her thoughts toward the other's possession of the good and away from her own defect she can disguise from herself what is crucially wrong and Save herself from hostility which is self- directed. m420 But f irst , there is nothing wrong with Claudia and her sister guarding their selves against feelings of shame and humiliation--of feeling not 'lcomfortable in [their] ~kins~~~'--whichwould inevitably be produced if they saw themselves as essentially inferior to Maureen and not worthy of equal consideration. Secondly , admittedly on one level their hostility toward Maureen is misdirected and self- deceptive, as Morrison writes: "And al1 the time we knew that Maureen Peal was not the Enemy and not worthy of such intense

419 Taylor, Vnvy and Jealou~y,~243.

420 Taylor, "Envy and Jealousy ,ft 243. 421 Morrison, "The Bluest Eye,I1 2108. 194 hatred. The Thing to fear was the ~hingthat made her

beautif ul, and not US. n42Z Perfectly targeted hostility would be directed at a society that promotes racist beauty ideals and constructs girls and women as sex objects competing for beauty. In this sense, Taylor is correct to claim that envy cannot change what is basically wrong with a personvs situation. 423 Envy protects Claudia and her sister against self-hatred but also from a hatred that might be overwhelming and difficult to bear because of a sense of powerlessness it could provoke before an all-arching system of oppression. Solomon claims that in envy:

the other person is recognized as having a right to the envied object, whether or not he had any responsibility in obtaining it. One does not see oneself as having any such right, only an intense desire, more than likely compounded with a well-rationalized wish for the revolutionary overthrow of the very system of rights which deprives him. 424 He gives the example of a beggar who envies a rich donor, maintaining that although the former concedes that the other has a right to his well-earned money while he himself does not, he "would welcome the insurrection that would put that

422 Ibid., emphasis in original.

423 Gabriele Taylor, "Envy and Jealousy , 243.

424 Soiornon, ThePassions. 250. 195 money up for grabs-or, out of spite (envyls more violent sibling) he would welcome the catastrophe that would bring the rich man to po~erty.~~~~~As a rather significant aside, Solomon

remarks that the beggar may admire the work the other engaged in that brought him to acquire his wealth? This example of envy, with its specifics, well supports Solomonls analysis of envy and his view of envy as wholly despicable and ethically worthless. The beggarts envy is presented as embedded in other vices; he is assumed to be poor out of laziness, instead of hardship or lack of opportunities, and to be full of spite. In contrast, the rich man is not only portrayed as industrious, obtaining his wealth through hard work, but also as generous, being a donor. But consider the case of a beggar who envies a rich donor who has not earned al1 his money through work but inherited it, belonging to a lineage of cotton plantation owners. On one level she does not deny the rich man's right to his money or see herself as entitled to it: she is not his kin. But in another sense, she sees herself as just as deserving of his money; after all, she might reason, he did not personally earn the money and the money was obtained by exploiting others, namely, black people treated as slaves. If she is a black person and has ancestors who were used as slaves she may see

425 Ibid., 250,

426 Ibid, 196 herself as more deserving of the money than he, regarding the money as a form of compensation for the sufiering her ancestors endured. Here envy would seem perfectly understandable and highly defensive only in the most positive of terms. Taylor presents Rawls' claim that great inequalities in the distribution of primary goods will cause a loss of self- esteem in those at the losing end so that their feelings of envy should not be judged irrational. But to this she responds that although in such cases the beliefs infolming envy may be fully justified and rational, "envy consists not merely in holding such beliefs. At the time of experiencing emotional envy the other-directed hostile feelings will still be self-protective, and so self-deceptive and self-defeating. While in the throes of the motion the person concerned still wants to change the situation by rnagi~.~~"But it is interesting to note that among the characters of Claudia and her sister, on the one hand, and their child playmate Pecola, on the other, it is the latter who does not experience envy, or any negative feeling, toward Maureen and who seeks to transform her situation by magic, by going to the t%piritual counsellormmSoaphead and requesting that he grant her blue eyes. Pecola believes that if she had blue eyes she would stop being abused and have the love reserved for all "The

427 Gabriele Taylor, "Envy and Jealousy," 248. 197

Shirley Temples of the world. n428 WhiLe the understandable kind of envy that Claudia and her sister experience contains an element of self-deception in targeting Maureen instead of oppressive societal values and structures, it is not self-defeating. It protects their sense of self-worth and a conception of themselves as moral agents who have some control over their fate, who cm make meaningful choices despite constraints. 1t is, tragically , Pecola s admiration of Maureen's "white beautyl@that is self-defeating. Convinced that "only a miracle could relieve her, she would never know her bea~ty."~'~Internalizing the view of others of her as a poor, ugly, black girl, she carries within her a deep sense of shame. After her father rapes her and she becomes pregnant, lacking al1 emotional tools for protection, she falls deeply into despair, eventually becoming entrapped in insanity: Whe flailed her arms like a bird in an eternal, grotesquely futile effort to fly. Beating the air, a winged but grounded bird, intent on the blue void it could not reach- -could not even see-but which filled the valleys of the mind. 1n430

428 Morrison, "The Bluest Eye,lV 2076.

429 Ibid., 2092.

4 30 Morrison, "The Bluest Eye, II 2 182. In the case of Pecola, closed in from al1 sides, racially, sexually, and economically oppressed, and (as a result) without even a fraction of buoying self-respect to help her stay afloat, despair hastens her demise. Indeed, completely lacking in the bite of bitterness or resentment, despair would not seem the kind of motion to have any potential transformative force. Solomon writes : "Despair is a judgment of unhappy resignation, a conclusion of futility, an admission of defeatw where one sees oneself as a victim of cruel fortune and takes no responsibility for one's fail~re.~~' On his view, while despair is completely impotent, depression, by contrast, carries within it the seed of self-fulfilment: depression may be "the beginning of self-realization," where one puts into question values one has heretofore accepted and now experiences as tedious , unlivable and degrading .432 one can either choose to continue to live by values one finds intolerable and risk suicide or actively try to achieve a better situation. 433 Solomon's description of depression, though, is very similar to Kierkegaard's account of despair

...... --...-p. -

431 Solomon, The,300-301.

432 Ibid., 237-8. 433 Ibid. expressed in me Sickn~_UntoDeath, 434 and it would seem that the emotions bear strong resemblances to each other, both involving, as Solomon concedes, a profound sense of hopelessness and meaninglessness. While the tearful purging of depression can be transfomative, resulting in newfound meaningfulness and productivity, the insipidity of despair can also move one to change, as when a light is perceived through a fog and one follows it out into the clear. In Christha Steadts novel me Man Who Loved chi,435 the main character, Louie, becomes despairing about her familyts integrity because of her parentst regular violent fights and their neglect of her and her siblings. One night she ruminates over the misery she and her siblings experience because of their extremely stressful home life and decides that the only solution is for her to kill her parents: II look awful,' thought Louie, land ittsbecause 1 have no decent home; and the children are al1 getting sulky-

looking too. If 1 killed them both they would be ee.. Only one thing was certain: it must be done, to Save the children. @Who careç for them except me? she thought coldly . These two self ish, passionate

'-" Soren Kierkegaard, me Si-ess Uao De-: a loond. . w,ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980).

"' Christina Stead, 3- Whg Loved C~n(New York: Rinehart and Winston, 1965). 200

people, terrible as gods in their eternal married hate, do not care for them; Mother herself threatened to kill them. Perhaps she would: at any rate, their life will be a ruin if they are allowed to go on living. 436 Despair gives Louie sharper insight into the true hopelessness of ber family situation and compels ber to act in accordance with her discovery: "She should have done it before but had not the insight nor the ~i11."'~' Later on we read: vvShenever once doubted that the right thing to do was to use cyanide tomorrow morning, or that she must liberate the children: it fell to her, no one else would do it or understand the causes as she did.vt438As testified to by Morrisonvs story of Seth who kills her children to Save them from slavery, or living deaths, sometimes self-love or love of others warrants drastic, 'evilv measures. Louiegs sense of desperation is well founded. Given that the children are not being physically or sexually abused (though there is some suggestion of sema1 abuse) but severely emotionally abused Louie has little recourse. The kind of abuse they are suffering does not have distinct, concrete manifestations like cuts, bruises and broken bones and is difficult to have addressed by child welfare agencies, law enforcement officiais, or the courts.

4 36 Ibid., 501-503.

4 37 Ibid., 503. 4 38 Ibid., my emphasis. 201 With no legal rights or options in terms of where they can live, the children are tmly trapped. To put it in Sartrian terms, this is a situation where 'evilt is required nnbothby the goal and by the nature of the resistan~es.~~~~Sartre mites: InTo cross this gully, a plank is necessary. Necessity appears through the fact that this plank is not there and because we try to make the crossing in vain. Because a plank is necessary for crossing the gully, Var some end, it is itself an end, that is, something that ought to be and a value. tt441 Similarly, for Louie to transcend a gully of despair, levil' is imperative, something that must be realized as a moral good. Louie does not fully realize her plan, but she does go so far as to approach her mother with a cup of cyanide. Her mother, understanding what she intends, says to her husband:

"Shets not to blame, shevsgot guts, she was going to do it-- she's not to blame, if she were to go stark staring mad-your daughter is out of her mind.w442That her rnother takes the cup and drinks it also supports the extreme solution Louie has chosen, just like her brother Erniens attempt to hang himself moments before hearing of his mother's death. The death of

439 Sartre, Notebooks for an Ethj CS, 97. 440 Ibid, emphasis in original.

44 1 Ibu. , 98.

442 Stead, The Man Who Jsved -en, 507. 202 her mother has a jolting effect over the family, jostling them about so that Louie is able to break free and leave for good, as if the death were like an interna1 pressure pushing a cage door open: "How different everything looked, like the morning of the world, that hour before al1 other hours which Thoreau speaks of, that most matinal hour. ""' For Louie, levilf provides a way out of her constrained situation, a way of escaping insanity, or the fate of Morrisonls character Pecola. Whereas at the end of "The Bluest Eye, Pecolams life has ended, at the end of me Man

o Loved Curr\, Louiels life has just begun, a world of possibilities opening up to her. The moral power of despair, like that of the other *nastyl emotions 1 have been considering throughout this chapter, depends on the context, the severity of constraints and inner and outer resources. Likewise, as seen in earlier chapters, the moral force of @nicefemotions like love and compassion is also relative. In the face of the real, inexorable destructiveness of Louiefs parents, a loving attitude toward them, by which Louie tried to get them to acknowledge their problems and get help, would have presented as much resistance as a dogfs tail wag. This discussion of the potential moral value of negative emotions indicates, to echo Murdoch, who echoes Plato, how morality is intimately connected with progress, how moral

4 4 3 Ibid., 525. 203 tasks take one ont0 higher and higher rungs of moral achievement. In the account I have been defending, which does not insist on an orientation away from the 'selfishl ego, these rungs are very personal in character. For a severely oppressed person like Morrisonts character Pecola, moral progress could take the form first of despair, where she experiences a great sense of hopelessness and disorientation, having no sense of herself as a being with a persona1 domain worthy of respect; then envy, where she feels some claim to such a domain, though without much security, since the goods she feels she deserves are not forthcoming and her desire receives no external validation; then resentment, where she perceives herself as wronged, or as the victim of injustices, and thus achieves self-respect; and finally anger, closely associated with resentment, where her resentment becomes more righteous, ' where her sense of being wronged reaches the boiling pointt. Love, the only emotion to which Murdoch attributes moral value, is noticeably a hindrance in terms of Pecola's moral development, since Pecolats love exhausts itself in grandiose, racist admiration of blond, blue-eyed children. CONCLUSION: REVOLUTIONARY MORALITY

This ~achiavellian moral account will strike many as repellent, since it enjoins them to do what traditionally has been seen as morally reprehensible-not to always turn the other cheek, but to sometimes engage in 'evill, giving expression to 'nastyf emotions. It is a very demanding ethic in requiring us to engage in radical self-examination, confronting barriers and uprooting our moral prejudices. To be clear, however, 1 am not claiming that lsaintlinessl is not morally good, that a life devoted to caring for the poor and sick lacks moral value. 1 am not saying that someone who leads this kind of life is not, or cannot be, a moral hero. Rather, I am calling attention to the fact that even a 'saintlyl person might sometimes have to engage in 'evil,' be crafty and ruthless, instead of benevolent, in order to realize morally praiseworthy ends. Saintliness (pure 'goodness') is not a desirable ideal partially because it is not a realistic, realizable one; as seen with the character

Helen from meEvre discussed in Chapter 2, the ideal of pure Igoodness~ is undermined in the actual, concrete pursuit of it. mile 1 argued in Chapter 1 that Mother Teresa's care work may not have been altogether praiseworthy given that she rejected for her patients more effective, modern care, this does not mean that careworkers accepting donations from criminals and despots to assist them in their care work, as

Mother Teresa did, is always or necessarily morally bad. 444

Further, Mother Teresa's fierce belief in the sanctity of - human life, which grounded her charitable work in the slums of India, led her, perhaps consistently, to a severe anti- abortionist stance and a nasty denunciation of women who seek abortion. Even beautiful beliefs, when pursued aggressively, have thorns . sometimes one may make great sacrifices for others thinking one is benefiting them, as when a mother slaves away for her children, without realizing that such lsaintliness' is not really benefiting anyone: she may be uncornfortable with developing her own abilities and talents and stays in the role that has been assigned to her while unwittingly hindering the independence of her children, who may feel helpless without her. When people harm others and themselves for no good end, they behave immorally. This does not necessarily mean they are bad people, but perhaps only that in this particular respect their behaviour is not promoting human goods, is not in the moral realm but in the realm of shadows, in ignorance and weakness. The traditional mother has not ken enlightened and empowered by ferninist values and feels her way blindly through life, questioning nothing, accepting everything, as if existing in Platois cave. hirther, sometimes people express

444 This raises some very complex issues which cannot be dealt with adequately here. 206 self-righteous indignation toward those who commit atrocious crimes, who are moral failures. They do not question why it is that they do not themselves engage in such extreme destructive behaviour; they do not examine their differences or their privileges, their advantages. Their negative feelings are impotent, and cannot catapult th- into the realm of the moral and be chamelled into constructive projects that address the underlying causes of brutal behaviour.

But once one aàmits that everyone has the potential to be destructive and does inevitably harm others without producing any beneficial effect for anyone-no one can be a perfect person-one will be able to deal more responsibly with this potential and use it toward morally good ends. Noddingsl recommendation that we learn to live "patiently with the evil in ourselves and other~~"~--actingto ensure that this *evill does not boil over in destructive acts-is not what 1 think dealing more responsibly with evil involves. This is because of my essential difference with Noddings regarding the potential moral value of levil*. When people refuse to admit that they have behaved imrnorally there may not only be the fear that such acknowledgment might be equivalent to admitting to having a bad character but also that they will be punished in some way for their immorality. In cases of heinous crimes this fear is we11-founded. But in cases of less severe

445 Noddings , Yomeand Evi 1, 3 2. 207 wrongdoing, such as mistreating a friend, the worst punishment may be simply seeing oneself in a bad light, seeing oneself as a bad person. But if one recognizes that behaving immorally is not literally, or essentially, equivalent to causing harm then one cm see that the simple fact that one harmed another does not mean that one was immoral. Rather, one was immoral in this particular instance because one did not use one% 'evill toward morally good ends; the harm did not contribute to the attainment of moral goods. By reasoning in this way, one can more readily take responsibility for one's wrongdoing, instead of thinking along the traditional line that since immorality is the expression of levil' human tendencies one's immoral behaviour signifies that one is a bad person, the kind who does not keep such tendencies in check. One can Say, "Yes

1 did wrong," without fearing that one will be struck by lightning or flung into the fires of hell.

As discussed in Chapter 1, Taylor argues that a major problem with formalisms like kantianism and utilitarianism is that they only regard two types of considerations as morally relevant. These considerations are (1) that which is expressed in the notion of utility, that what produces happiness is preferable to what produces pain; and (2) what rnay be referred to as "the universal attribution of personality," the notion that in moral reasoning everyone counts, and thus is the source of moral imperatives, the view 208 that Kant affirrn~.~~~Formalisms leave out an important third consideration, namely, that which is expressed when we invoke languages of qualitative contrast to refer to various goals, projects and commitments. 447 The kind of moral account that 1 am embracing may be seen as giving primacy to this third type of moral consideration. This may be true, but it does not mean that the other types of consideration have no relevancy on my account. In fact, hy account may be seen to give these more weight than do formalisms in that it maintains that a life of simply existing, of more pain than pleasure, of absolute misery and oppression, where one's fundamental human rights are accorded no real substance, is simply not worth living. To refer back to an earlier example, a woman might harm her husband to stop him from beating their daughter out of intense rage (an 'evil' emotion) that a serious injustice is being committed against her daughter for whom she cares. Similarly, as seen in the last chapter, a girl might kill her parents to stop them from emotionally destroying her siblings out of despair that her parentsr behaviour is preventing them, for whom she cares, from exercising their fundamental rights to life, liberty, and happiness. In insisting that we challenge oppressive structures a Machiavellian feminist account calls on us to cultivate more

4 4 6 Taylor, Ehilosophv and the H~mgnScjences, 244. 447 Ibid. 209 sensitivity toward human suffering. Though we are not being grossly insensitive if we pass by a homeless person begging for money and ignore her, not doing even the smallest thing to help her gain self-mastery, we nonetheless do moral wrong: we behave immorally. Some will find this evaluation too strong because we do not violate any of the homeless person's moral rights if we refuse her our time. Refusing her our help, the argument could go, is not on a par with beating her or stealing her belongings. Another reason that someone might be reluctant to regard refusing a homeless person help as morally wrong is that they think that to call something morally wrong is to see it as a very bad thing, as a sign of an evil character. The crux of the matter is that though we do not violate any of the homeless womanfs moral rights when we refuse her our help, it is very possible that someone in her past did violate her rights, and repeatedly. Herman writes in Trauma md Recoverv that 50-60% of people in American psychiatric hospitals have been the victims of child abuse, which, because of the damage it can cause to a person's psyche undermines the victim's ability to function in the everyday ~orld.~~'Let us suppose that the homeless woman (let's call her "Alexandraw) was previously living in a psychiatric institution and is a victim of prolonged, severe child abuse resulting in her

448 Herman, 122. 210 developing numerous emotional and psychological problems. To simplify things, let us suppose that she is 25 and that her parents, who abused her, are dead. She would very much like to have a place to live. Who is responsible for that? In advocating that the moral agent ignore the specific social contexts in which moral problems occur and distance himself from 'selfishm concerns and 'befuddling' passions, traditional, ideal theories of perfect justice tell us that we should be charitable toward Alexandra and drop her some coins. They do not, however, direct us to look closely at her situation, to see how she is ensnared within larger social nettings. They do not encourage us to question the morality of patriarchal, capitalist structures which keep humanity divided into the rich and the poor, the dominant and the subordinate. With cold, abstract terms like "equalityW and "justicegf they keep at a distance that which threatens to destroy their nice appearances-a barrage of rape, domestic violence, child abuse, poverty, homelessness--that make their clean, neat division of human potentialites into 'good' and 'evil' ones seem a little like tidying up a room by hiding al1 the mess underneath the bed. In Sartre's "Second Ethics," presented in his Lecture in

Rome 449 he argues that tme morality is grounded in the most

449 This lecture was given in Rome, May 1964, at the Gramsci Institute, and is available at the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. 211 basic needs of human beings, material goods as well as

freedom, self-respect, knowledge, love and meaningfulness. 4 50

True morality has as its ultimate goal or nom what Sartre - calls "integral humanity." "Alienated moralities," by contrast, "present a perverted nom and image of humanityBf because they are not founded on the most fundamental needs of

humanity in their purest forms. 451 Rather, the needs they are designed to fulfill arise within "a particular practico-inert system," particular historical, social structures, which are oppressive, and multiply or splinter human needs incessantly so that true human needs are lost sight of and a fragmented

humanity is sought after. 452 For Sartre, in order for the oppressive system to be overcome, organizations and structures can and must be created within that system as instruments for its destruction, such as unions and parties. The system carries the seeds of its own destruction and these should be nurtured and fostered. True morality is revolutionary morality. Though it is not in the service of oppressive historical structures it nonetheless cannot avoid confrontation with these, and thus Sartre claims that toward the end of realizing the ideal of true human fulfilment in a

4 50 Thomas C. Anderson, -els Two Emics: From to 1nteqza.l Hdtv (Chicago: Open Court, 1993)

Ibid., 125.

452 Ibid. classless society, under certain conditions, harmful acts like violence can be morally go~d.~''

Sartre s %econd Ethics ," like the ethics of Machiavelli , is realistic, and accords supreme ethical value to that which is necessary to attain an ideal society. In a vein similar to that of ~achiavelli,Sartre maintains that so long as the end is integral humanity whatever means are used to achieve that end are morally good: the end justifies the means. Sartre writes: It is true that morality is the superstructure of the ruling class, but it is also true that this morality is a joke, since it is necessarily built upon exploitation. Yet even though the economic and political motives of the explosions of popular violence are obvious, the explosions cannot be explained except by the fact that these motives were morally appreciated by the masses. That is, the economic and political motives helped the masses to understand what is the highest immorality--the

exploitation of [humanity by humanity]. So when the bourgeois claims that his conduct is guided by a 'humanistic' morality--work, family, nation--he is only disguising his deep-seated immorality and trying to alienate the workers: he will never be moral. 4 54

Ibid. , 4 54 Jean-Paul Sartre, "The Maoists in France," Written and SDO~,tram. P. Auster 213 On Sartre's view, it is morally right for the oppressed to rebel against existing social systems because the moralities informing them are unjust, promoting the interests of the bourgeoisie alone. Kekes claims that moral life is "a continuum between moral monstrosity and saintho~d.~~'~~On my view, however, in the immoral reaïm we find pettiness, welenting or pointless greed and jealousy, self-consuming despair, gratuitous hatred and cruelty , blank indifference, non-ref lection and apathy . Moral goodness, by contrast, occurs across a landscape in various transient shapes and fonns, sometimes saintly, sometimes monstrous, but usually unremarkable and simply pleasing. It cornes in an assortment of flavours-ois expressed in a variety of motions--some strong or bitter, others faint or sweet . Murdoch mites : Goodness is connected with the acceptance of real death and real chance and real transience and only against the background of this acceptance, which is psychologically so difficult, can we understand the full extent of what

virtue is .456 It may be said that traditional moral accounts, in looking to

and L. Davis (New York: Pantheon Books, 1977) 170.

455 Kekes, Facing Evil, 120.

4 56 Murdoch, 5GOO& 103. 214 a utopian image of society for determining moral virtues, deny

Our insurpassable imperfection . ftde Beauvoir states: '*Woman is doomed to immorality, because for her to be moral would mean that she must incarnate a being of superhuman qualities: the 'virtuous woman' of Proverbs, the

' perf ect mother l, the @ honest woman ' , and so on. lt4" A realist Machiavellian account of morality saves women and other members of oppressed groups from this condemnation by giving a new radical meaning to the words of Milton's Satan: Vvil, be thou my good. As Rich writes, "We have had enough suicidal poets, enough suicidal women, enough of self-destructiveness as the sole form of violence permitted to women.w458

4 57 Simone de Beauvoir, me Second Sex. Trans. and Ed. H.M. Parshley (New York: Bantham Books, 1961) 447.

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